Why I chose to be a doctor; and why I contemplate suicide/homicide/genocide at times.

Misfortunes apparently never come single. I always thought, what a corny line. Turns out, true it is.
My Laal chhadi broke down in the middle of the road on my way to college. Caused me very public embarrassment with one Luna fellow yelling, "En swaami, 1950's model-a?". Luna! Imagine degree of embarrassment. I said FUUUUUCK really loud which made one Iyengaar type auntie close the ears of her child, and scowl at me.
My really cool Pepe Jeans and Levi's bags are torn, and one of them spilled books on spit-strewn street. (Spit is no decoration; no, not even when it is red and green. No.)
My shirt today was a mild shade of pink, and had all manner of people, of all known persuasion leering at me for no reason. (No reason?)
On my way back, on foot, on really worn out Nike-s, I laid eyes on a really black crow digging its really black beak into a really dead black rat which had large and ugly incisor teeth.
And now, I have really ugly Uppittu/Upma for lunch because Amma has gone to some Devara Samaaradhane. Cousin getting married. Yeah, that's what we need. More marriages, more pregnancies, more hell for us who hate OB-G. (Stop getting married. And stop making children. If at all you have to, do it the Kunti way. Besides, whoever said you have to make children if you get married. Stupid grandmothers, and their obsession with grandchildren having sex. Sheesh.)

So, aside from establishing me as irreverent, insolent, condescending, brandwhore-ing, racist (even about animals), Upma-hating, OBG-DESPISING, grandmother-idiosyncrasy un-understanding, it also establishes that I am a wee bit pissed off.

[Vodafone continues to be a bitch. What's in a name? Those bastards insist on calling me, like every half hour. I am in half a mind to call their (non-existent) Customer Care and finally break their bubble. I don't have big breasts, I don't wear pink mini-skirts and I most certainly am not going to handcuff you and sing Tu, tu hain wahee in a phone-booth. Stop Calling Me.]

The whole point of the post is lost. Hutch rubs me that way. As also Dr.L, The Bastard.
So, why I chose to be a doctor.

First up, Dr. Spunky Monkey sounds way cool. My actual name sounds way-hay cooler. The nurses would all go "Dr. S, Dr. S, the Prime Minister's vitals are crashing. You are the only one who can save him". Then, I would be all House MD-like, and go, "Nurse Clare, push adrenaline (and like they do on those medico soaps) stat". Then she would be like "No Dr. S, he crashes, even as my tight white dress unbuttons all by itself". Then I'd be like, "It's time we used the robotic arm we procured for $6m to conduct a super surgery through a hole 3 microns wide". Nurse Clare, in Silk Smitha mode would go, "Doctorr Ess, yuu naaati". I'd go "Huyn?". She'd go, "Oh, it's something we nurses like saying; it could mean anything, it's like you saying Gerstmann-Straussler-Scheinker syndrome to anybody who came with so much as a common cold"

And so on and so forth would the Doctor-Nurse repartee go; emphasis being on the way Dr. S is enunciated.
(If you haven't read my Disco Shanti-Silk Smitha post, it's time you did. One of my personal favorites, that one.)
(I am so shameless, no?)

Secondly, I immediately become the center of attraction in any family function. Most notably, our fabulous weddings. It's also the same time when amma-appa's faces look like they could light the whole wedding hall, and no Happydent required, thank you.
We enter the hall. The Nadaswaram is invariably playing "Raghumvamsha Sudha". And then, disssstant relative, who wears the same raw silk Jubba for every wedding identifies us from a really long distance and goes,
"Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho (crescendo and de-crescendo), barbek barbeku, kaLe banthu choultry-g eega"
(Oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho, come come, now comes brightness to this godawfully stuffy wedding hall)
"Ayyo, neevoLLe chennaythu", amma would beam while appa would grin an appa-grin.
(Ayyo, stop talking out of your arse, and get off our butts, is what I would say in my head)
"Enantaare, engineer-u, doctor-u?"
(What say the Engineer and Doctor?)
"Shut up, for one, and use a mouthwash, for another", I'd say. In my head, of course.
"Waat is thees, daaktar himself lookking like payshunt", he'd grin.
And there I was, thinking my unshaven, unkempt look would be called nonchalance-meets- grunge. Bah.
I'd make some polite joke to the effect that the books are really heavy, or generate random surrealism about medicine being the elixir of phantasmagoria and scoot to sip some of that excellent filter kaapi that only these bhatta-s can brew.
While our man halitotic would go on to appa-amma about, "Neev biDi, obba injiniyurru, obba daaktru, laatri hoDdri, doDDong yaavaag maduve, namm kaDe oLLe huDgi idey, dipplamo compheetralli. Wurd gotthu, eemale aalso"
(Oh you leave. One son Engineer, one Doctor, lottery only. When are you getting the first son married, we have a girl from our side, diploma in computers!! She knows Word, and e-mails also!!!)
"Sadhyakkilla, he is only 22 ree!"
(Not right now, he is merely 22 dude)

While this conversation gets repeated with about 250 other relatives, I show my teeth too often and generally behave like a bum walking in a pot induced haze. And feel immensely cool when relatives acknowledge me for being an astute clinician.
"P anna's son, Dr. S, still studying, but said EXACTLY what the doctor told us", one really nice uncle would go.
The aunties would all do a chorus "Bhesh, bhesh, bhale, bhale!"
(I prescribed Crocin, I think. But that's really besides the point)
One of the aunties would then go, "He was always a bright child. Vanajaa, remember the time he sang Mahaganapatim when he was 8? It still rings in my ears as though it was yessturday!"
(For all I know, I would probably have called the raga Naati, in place of Naata)
"Yes, yes, that one. Remember that Shilpa Shetty song, what was it called, Chhuraake dil meraa that he used to sing soo well?"
(Oh-oh, this is not going too well. Butt in, NOW)
"So, auntie how is your son? How's that Dengue of his coming along?"
"Aww, such a modest child, and so caring also! He is doing very good ma, Spunky Monkey. JUST like you told he would be"
(I had said, give lots of fluids and stuff, wait for one week or so, it might probably go)

It is this kind of adulation for no reason, that gives me the kicks. And makes me forget momentarily about my monumental disasters in exams back in college. That, and wrinkled old grandmums coming up to me, holding my hands with theirs, dotted as they are with liver spots of the many years they have spread joy and wisdom, and saying, "Your grandma, how unlucky she was; she would have been so happy to see you become the first doctor of the family", shedding a quiet tear and blessing me with all the goodwill their small bodies can muster. And I check their pulse in return!

Thirdly, they all give me money when I fall at their feet. Which is really fun. I bend over, I am paid. (Shut up, you pervert.) Strangely enough, they even consider my opinion. Nodding along vehemently to whatever I say, and making me feel like I am in the United Nations fighting for India's bid for a permanent seat in the Security Council. And they end up saying, "From one of the best medical colleges in the country after all". Which is true, according to India Today/Outlook/The Week, but SO not, according to me.

Fourthly, do you have any idea how easily doctors can admonish people? They can yell at patients if they are being total pains in the backsides. How I LOVE the prospect of yelling! And generally being the nose-in-the-air guy with the most acerbic tongue a la Dr. Parry Cox in Scrubs. Ahh, the joys of it.

Fifthly, when I was in eighth standard, brother S fell sick and had to be admitted in this hospital. I went visiting, like younger brothers do. There was this uncle of mine who drilled into my head over a week or so, this line. "This college is cool; if you have to do medicine, you HAVE to do it here". The tape played forever in my head. Besides, this place had really yo! doctors that spoke really good English (that's SUCH a huge plus for me), and had deer inside the campus! Now, that's gotta do something to a heart infested with Enid Blyton. Then I decided I'd study here and know all about the deer psychology. I haven't progressed much beyond knowing that they don't like grass. Especially when I hold it out for them to eat.
(Sheesh, did I give away way too much about myself? Cut the deer bit people. No deer, okay?)

Sixthly, did you know medical professionals need the highest IQ of any job? Yes, we are at the very top of the hierarchy. And I just wanted the world to know about it. Hence this whole elaborate exercise involving dead body cutting, digging through shit for parasites, measuring toilet dimensions, putting up with really, REALLY, REALLY nagging classmates and carrying around books that could well help Bappi Lahiri, the Big Momma, to get back to shape.
(Okay, you had the last laugh. Snap out of it already)

Then of course, to gross people out. And make certain people give up choice items on the menu. Just say, "That post-mortem we saw today, man, that was pretty gory even for a post-mortem. Totally smashed the skull no? New assistant I think, the brain matter splashed on all of us. One piece went to A's open mouth. Tasted like wet sponge, he said. Then of course was that really shoddy rectum job. Couldn't he pull the guts out properly. Parts of the intestines were dangling like chicken necks, the colon was full of crap still".
And the ice cream is yours.
(It's another matter however that on the first day at the dissection table, the macho-est beefchunks said they had to go to the toilet and did not return for hours.)

So much for why I chose to be a Doctor.

About the contemplations I talk of, suffice to say you don't have to call me in the dead of the night to confirm from me that you should not take medicines past their expiry date. What are you, Miss South Carolina? It's called Expiry for some reason no? Ex- gone, Expire- GONE, ex-pyre - Harischandra Ghat type GONE. Don't take it, and don't ask me again. Pah, I must have burst an aneurysm or two.
And auntie, it is true, I do study Gynecology. Yes, it is about women and their, er, problems. But please don't discuss your menstrual history with me. Please. Please?

The Way We Are

Our family, like regular readers of this space know all too well, is fairly complicated.
Yes, dear readers, in this latest Monkey Scroll, I return to My Family.
With it I mean, like you are all rightly guessing, my extended family, about the population of Burkina Faso, my beloved country. (Now, there's a country I'd like to take over in a coup; so I could be registered forever in the annals of history of Burkina Faso as the first man in the country to type Burkina Faso on a computer, as also to be the first man to use a toothbrush)

Digression, dammit.
Just you imagine my exam papers; once I rambled on about a disease that "stings like a scorpion, drinks like a fish (WTF), eats like a wolf, burrows like a rodent and kills like a leopard", to be disturbed only by the dirty stare of the invigilator, and thus also realize I was writing about something as uncool as Pancreatitis, meh. No offence to one of my favorite bloggers, Adorable Pancreas, of course. Besides, that line is no offshoot of my magic realism infested mind (harr, harr), but one paraphrased from a Surgery textbook that insists on referring to them as "Wisdom Lines". Ah, succinct.
Digression, dammit.

Gulzar returns to Taj Westend for inspiration; David Dhawan to jokes shared by truckdrivers on the Ambala-Amritsar highway.
I, return to my family.

We are a family full of quirks. Living in one like this has its many moments. Just like today; an uncle who abhors conversions so much that he said, "Look how these Kiristan types are infiltrating. The new 2 rupee coin has a cross on it!".
But all that is part of Being Brahmin, but of course.
Today, we explore quirks and the like of our bona-fide KanBrahm family.

1. We love Dr. Rajkumar; to life, to death, and beyond.

Now this one is quite the quirk; just like amma points out every so often. We may be a Brahmin-centric family, but we are so culturally tolerant we should all get honorary Sangeet Natak Akademi awards. The argument here being, Vishnuvardhan, the Smartha-Hoysala Karnataka boy deserves all our praise, but no. We loathe the man and his hundred dogs. To us, the Eediga boy, despite his hippopotamus wife and dyslexic children (with one of them creepily resembling a chimpanzee) is The God.
Appa has watched close to everyone of his films (206), and Amma can sing entire lyrics of his songs, and we groove to "Eef yuu cum todayy". If anybody wants to take potshots at that song, I shall personally ensure your castration. Aseptic, of course.
What a sad period it was for us when he was abducted by that Jungle Boy with the porcine whiskers. Amma, I am sure, did extra ashtottarams everyday for his speedy release. And look how much God listens to her, he was out after 108 days!
Then of course, was the day we lost him, that great man whom we love despite his "Lovw mee aar hayt mee". Amma shrieked a big shriek, and I thought she saw big lizards copulating (for you know, that is double reason to. LIZARDS and SEX! The horror, the horror). But no, it was that Rajkumar had died.
If anybody wants to argue against his greatness, or that NTR, MGR, MRF whoever was superior to him, please visit us. We will keep you occupied.

2. We stay away from Telugu people, thank you.

It's not about their surnames, no. We have made our peace with Korraguntla, Errakundi, ityaadi. It's their Balakrishna-inspired wardrobe that makes us hyper-emetic. Only Govinda can pull off orange and distemper green. No one else, not even your Mahaputrudu Chiranjeevi, or Powerstar Pawan Kalyan.
Amma also opines that the Telugu sub-caste among Brahmins spell bad news. Discord they bring, apparently. So, Telugu biddas and babus, we discard.
Also, stop giving us Gongura chutney, even if you think that's the best thing to happen to food since rice. We Hate It. It takes like dogshit. (A sock in the face for every not-so-smart Alec who goes, "Have you tasted dogshit?" That will be some Gult, I imagine)
While we are at it, a note to Hyderabad. (It's NOT HyDeraBaD please. It gives me the creeps)
Stop Imitating Bangalore.
Besides, it's just humiliating to the women of the household, if a stray plumber declares an open threat, saying "Rape chestaanu".
They were just asking for tap repairs. Jesus.

3. We stay away from Tamilians, thank you.

We are okay if you are among those that follow the Sringeri Sharada Peetham, or if you can get us VIP entry into the Srirangam temple, but others, no.
Strangely enough, it's your wardrobe again. Kongaati.
And your obsession with filmstars. And your obsession with all things Tamil. And your obsession with keeping all display hoardings in Tamil. And your obsession with speaking only Tamil even when you realize I Am Not Getting It. So basically, you are an obsessive lot.
Just what is up with that sepulchral dung-a-taka-dung-a-taka music of yours? Sheesh.
Kaaveri, Lord Ram, His bridge, His monkeys, Sarah Jessica Parker's high heels. You have an issue with everything.

4. We stay away from Malayalees, thank you.

If it was wardrobe in the other two cases, it's the lack of it this time.
It's really a simple question, voiced by many women of our family: Why don't the women wear their pallu-s ever? It baffles them, it does. (This is of course based on the Malayalee women that appear on Kannada films.)
Also, can somebody please tell these Malayalees that we DON'T put coconut on Pani Puri? And that we are tired of the "there-is-a-Mal-everywhere" motif in their incredibly unfunny jokes? Yes, we get that there is a Mal tea shop on the Moon and in a nebula 25000 light years away. We Get It.
What is WITH the non-Hindu not being allowed entry into your super temples, eh? Beats me that one.
(But I love my Malayalee readers and their blogs. Tys, AP, Sreejith etc. My best friend is a Malayalee. So there)

5. We love Kannadigas.

So, yeah.

6. We don't cut cakes on birthdays.

This is something terribly special to only our family. A quirk, let's say. With a poignant tale behind it. So, don't laugh all you twits.
We don't believe in blowing candles, because that's just pointless.
The Cake then. Brother S had a big budday party with a huge cake and all. Our grandpa died only a few days later. I had this budday party in Delhi with a huge cake and all. Our grandma dies only a few days later. Another cousin had a few days before his birthday with plans to (there you go) cut a cake and all, but my paternal grandma passed away even before that could happen.
So yes. No Cutting Cake. We cut chai, though.

7. Maggi. What's that?

This one never fails to amuse my friends. I don't eat Maggi or Top Ramen or any of those things. The reason being, they look like snakes. No, you didn't just read a random surrealism. That, my dear readers, is true. Appa-Amma did some pooja-paath at a snake-shrine a zillion moons ago which forbids them from eating anything that's slender and (what else), snake-like. (This was the same pooja that Sachin Tendulkar recently did at the same venue. We had no paparazzi then, WTF.)
So, as it goes, we don't eat Maggi, Top Ramen, vermicelli and (ah, what coincidence) snake gourd.

8. B.A., B.Sc., B.Com. People do these?

I remember a cousin from up north visiting home, and saying he was doing B.A.
"WHAT?" was what we said, I remember. To his credit, the boy was doing a Mathematics honors B.A.
While in twelfth, I seriously considered studying Law. Which was also when mom decided I was capable of murder too.
"Law! Why? You want to wear black coats all your life?! White is so much more calm!" was what EVERYONE said. Wonder what they would have said if I said I wanted to do B.A. in English Literature.
I would probably be writing this one from a seedy internet cafe.
Or not.

9. Foreign returned = USA returned.

You go hike with the polar bears up in the North Pole, or do tap dance with the the penguins down South, we don't care. Unless you make that holy visit to the United Stated of America and take teertha-prasada at the Statue of Liberty, you do not qualify to be declared "Foreign Returned". Crossing the Arabian Sea is akin to crossing Madiwala Lake.
The Gulf Does Not Count.


So there. Nine snippets from Namma Family for the Nava Raatri.
Happy Festivals.


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

P.S.: We aren't as maniacally Kannadiga as you may be thinking. Appa watches news in English! And Amma thinks Homer Simpson is funny.

P.P.S.: This is fiction in parts. Talk about magic realism.

P.P.S.: Talking about magic realism, I am two books short of an All-Rushdie collection. Yay me!

Gheun Tag.

So, Tag it is.
After having ignored many many mails imploring me to spill out 18 wondrous factoids about myself, my illustrious life and career, I can't choose to ignore anymore. (Okay, they were forwards. Bite me.)
Also because I can't think of writing anything else. I sit before this black humming contraption and feel blanker than ever. At 21, I am drained. Stupid friends (and the film Proof) had convinced me that the decrescendo wouldn't start until 23. Oh, they'll get a piece of my mind. And extra sharp will be its edges.
Besides, nothing interesting is happening in my sad-ass life. That is of course excluding the fact that suction-evacuation (a method of abortion), according to our Obstetrics textbook, is an OUTDOOR (!) procedure (where are the proofreaders, where where?) and that pregnant women can dye their hair with impunity, without endangering the baby; a piece of information that made Rani jump in the manner of a pixie. Rani being a friend who is graying and balding. Sad times for her, these.

About the title; see, I like to believe I can pull off puns. And you need do nothing to convince me against it. (Living in my bubble is fun.).
I was thinking Tag-ore. But then, that would be just insulting the man, who in all kindness, has agreed to share his birthday with Spunky Monkey. (Yes, that is true. Wish me come May)
Then Tag-bug, Tag-bug, in an attempt to showcase my dhin-chak Bollywood side. If you are still wondering how that fits in, I was going for the "Tug-bug, Tug-bug" in Lakdee ki kaathi. Oh-kay, moving on.
Then sTag. To assert my single status, and thus attract the odd pretty fish with the red fin in the internet. But then, that would be ack desperate, and let's face it; I have a blog! That in itself, a friend agrees, is among the stages of clinical desperation.
It was then that Gheun Tag happened. What a concise phrase that one is! And how nice were those Channel [V] fillers with the Gheun Tak! You remember? Also, because it brings to fore my cross-lingual punning abilities. (I reiterate, living in my bubble IS fun)

Let's get ready to rumbaaaaallllllll.

1. Pick out a scar you have, and explain how you got it.

(What aptness in the questioning I say. Brings out your innermost secrets this Tag. Freud would have been proud of this venture.)

So, there was no one at home. I was bathing. Soap and all. Don't ask how else. Then, the bell went 'ding-dong', my favorite sound. Then, my brain started to race. Why? I was alone, and if I took any longer to open the door, they'd suspect I would be up to no good, what with the internet and the www and the unmentionable things therein.
Ayyo, ayyo, ayyo. (It is not a cliche/myth perpetuated by Mehmood and clan that the only exclamation South Indians know is "Ayyo! Ayyo! Ayyo!" It's actually quite true. Take it from me)
So, I run; wet, soapy, harried, holier-than-thou, and it was then that amma's extra-hard scrubbing of the floor, and sodium hydroxide took their combined prey. My chin. I cruised on the wet floor like a terrestrial fish and jammed against the edge of a wall. And bled. Like fucks. Which was also the time I decided against the Gladrags Manhunt thing.

If you thought the story was over, you also thought Bappi Lahiri was a man. So, no, not over yet.

One day I was walking along the hospital corridor for my Obstetrics (there, again) tutorial where a sad woman would be telling us the sad story of her sad life, read, the lecturer would be telling us the mechanism of labour in a breech presentation. (You don't want to know more, trust me). So, I was walking in front of the Ophthalmology department, (that was for you all to catch the irony bit), and fell.
Again.
And hurt myself.
Again.
On the same spot. My chin.
Again.
And bled like fucks.
Again.
My handkerchief looked like a, er, nevermind. It looked very spotted, let's say.

Had to get stitches. 4! On my face, damn it. To hide which, I have currently grown a goatee which by the way, has gotten so bristly I am considering harvesting them for a toothbrush company.
People suggested that I get a skin graft done, you know, skin off my butt on my face. I let that pass. I knew things would first begin with "Buttface!", then "Butt(ugly)face", and then wannabe Seinfelds going "Did you hear about the guy that had butt-cheeks and a butt-chin?". Gah.
And let's face it, I am no Hrithik Roshan.

So there, that was the long and tedious and tediously long story of the scar on my chin.
(I wish I was Hrithik Roshan, though)

2. What does your phone look like?

It looks like everything I don't look like. It's fat and dark and slow and nearly indestructible.
But then, it's getting what I will not - action. Its wallpaper currently is two millipedes fornicating. No, I am not into that kind of weirdness. But action is action. And it must be respected. It is a Nokia 6600, the marvel of mobile phone resilience. It Won't Break.

3. What is on the walls of your bedroom?

Currently, cobwebs. On the ceiling too, I see. And a spider doing a dangle-tango.
Also, a poster of Jimi Hendrix doing a weird pout thing. I know a grand total of six of his songs. But he hangs on the wall for purposes of coolness. There are also red stickers that read VIP Frenchie. And I can't believe I just said it. Assortment of posters, mosquito death spots, random pencil graffiti adorn my walls.
(and a small newspaper cut-out of Norah Jones.)

4. What is your current desktop picture?

It is a comic strip by Shannon Wheeler, called Too Much Coffee Man. I am sure you have heard of it. If not, you heard it now anyway.


So, yeah. Go read them. Funny funny funny they be.

5. Do you believe in gay marriage?

Look, I come from a country of donkey marriages and toad marriages. And where the biggest celebrities endorse tree marriages. Why not gay marriages then? At least by definition, they would be happy. And it is humans. That, is my first criterion for any marriage.

6. What do you want more than anything right now?

World Supremacy. Yeah.
Alternately, the Vice Chancellor's home number, so I could call his wife up and make up stories of infidelity and thus give him hell for the rest of his life. I hate my university. They are a bunch of undersexed assholes.

7. What time were you born?

I don't know if Amma is making this up to attribute every small detail of my life to a pre-designed proforma. But allegedly, I was born at 3:30 in the night. Which is why, she also vehemently insists, that I go to bed at around that time every night. She says she felt like going to the bathroom or something at about that time, and I suggested that I come out instead.
All said and done, I blame her pregnancy induced bladder issues for my poor attendance in Pediatrics, Orthopedics and Obstetrics-Gynecology.

8. Are your parents still together?

I mean, are you kidding me? To tolerate a monster child like me they need each other, very much. So, yes they are. And are, judging from the hush-hush tones I hear, conspiring to write a letter to their favorite astrologer on TV asking him when I would cut my hair (which is like Paul McCartney's during The Beatles' hippiest days) and shave that face fungus which, they say, makes me look like a Shivajinagar salesman selling them second-hand carpets.
Poor people; bad choice they made in thinking brother S would like somebody to play with. I near eat that holy child almost everyday.

9. Who was the last person that made you cry?

Sanjaya Malakar, and Ryan Seacrest every time he called him Sanzhaaya. Oh, what deadly lachrymose combination that was.
Also Michael Jackson. The man doesn't deserve all this. Come on, he can't even sniff a cry (that nose wouldn't let him), let alone the dilemma he has to face every time he has to fill in an application asking for gender, race, sexuality, nationality and planet.
And how can I forget Mr.L, whom regular readers of this blog might remember as the lascivious lecherous surgeon. The Bastard. No, he did not hit on me. But he might as well have; bloody near failed me, that midget with no balls.

10. What is your favorite perfume/cologne?

Huh? I don't know, but I think this one my cousin bought for me from the US would have to be my favorite.
It's called New York Nights, with a tagline that says Get Sexy. The fragrance ("mellow, smoldering, a bit macho") apparently lasts as long as I do, and it is "no wonder that women can't resist it". He chose wisely, my cousin. He recognized my dire need to socialize, from 8000 miles away.

11. What kind of hair/eye color do you like in the opposite sex?

(Why opposite sex?)
Anyhoo, straight. I like hair that way too.
Eyes, as long as they aren't red, I am fine. Talking of eye color, that guy Hugh Laurie, House MD, has unusually blue eyes. They are bluer than blue. They are like, BLUUUE.

12. What are you listening to?

An aircraft creating unsavory noise in the clouds, and pretty much all over Bangalore. Okay, now that moved away. So I listen to King Crimson, and their superlative 21st Century Schizoid Man.
But, lined right next is my current favorite, Disco 82!

Main ek Disco (ta ta taa)
Tu ek Disco (ta ta taa)
Main ek Disco, Tu ek Disco,
Duniya hain Disco!

13. Do you get scared of the dark?

Not particularly. But when it's dark, and the lizards are all aroused, and give each other those mating calls, is when I wish I was killed by that vicious mad dog that had chased me many years ago. Actually, the thing I most want right now, is for the entire lizard population in the world to die, and heap up on Dr.L, The Bastard.

14. Do you like Painkillers?

I like that song by Judas Priest. Songs like those obliterate the need to appreciatively nod, or let out that ironic smile, in response to the lyrics.
But yes, I strongly recommend it to others. Specially, my patients-to-be. Trust me, they'll need them.

15. Are you too shy to ask someone out?

Yes.
(See, I just shut up)
(See!)

16. If I could eat anything right now, what would it be?

Golgappa. The tastiest thing humankind ever invented.

17. Who was the last person that made you mad?

That thing pink, what is it called, Karan Johar. That one. And something called the Koffee Awards. Oh dear Lord of the Seven Hills. That is just about violating every one of my fundamental rights, and stretching the freedom of expression to intolerably strong shearing forces. What WAS that all about? If not for The Goddess Malaika Arora, my TV screen was in grave danger of developing a hole 29 inches wide.

18. Who was the last person that made you smile?

May be Amma. For what, I don't quite remember.
Or yeah, I smiled (like I always do) while listening to Lata in Manmohana bade jhoothe, when she takes those godawfully intricate taans in the end. That woman, to me, is all that is great music about. She turned 78 two days ago. Many many happy returns of the day to her, on behalf of everybody who cares for flawless notes.

(Why did it get all solemn in the end?)
(To relieve the solemnity, a PJ for you. Woh kya hain jo dil mein hain, mann mein hain, par dhadkan mein nahin?
.
.
.
Aamir Khan. HA HA HA)

I could mail you a powerpoint presentation called PJ World (what a fun world that must be to live in) if you, like me, happen to enjoy and laugh uproariously at such works of genius.

This tag, thus comes to an end.
For those that did not survive it, what's the point, you aren't reading this anyway.
For those that did, I hope you are okay. And you can write in regarding anything. We have only discussed some 16942 things in the entire post.

And I want everybody who has read this to go tag-bug, tag-bug.
I WILL keep a check on you.

On being Kannadiga, Brahmin, Smartha; and why our family is truly going global.

So, we are on the fast track to be a True Global Family.
Yes, yes; our proud Brahmin cousin has gathered some from somewhere and has somehow managed one Amreekan chick to go wee! with him. Chick is NRI type, but hey, Amreeki prajaa at any cost.
(You, and you, shove that smirk up where no sun does shine indeed. She'll get to go to Pravasi Bharateeya Divas and take part in discussions about the magically charming experience that is being the diaspora, all the while sipping masala chai and munching garma garam pakode. Can you, CAN you, huh, HUH?)

While I anticipated the need for multiple defibrillators to go beep-beep all over the town accompanied by unequivocal screams of "Ayyo ayyo, dharmabhrashTha", I was certainly not ready for what followed.
Practised nonchalance, that's what did.
The slew of Maavas, Attes, Chikkappas, Chikkammas, Bhaavas, Attiges, Maidunas, Naadinis, Doddammas, Doddappas, Shadkas, Orgittis, (assortment of relatives, for my non-Kannadiga readers) and alphabetagammas cold shouldered the expectant piece of information. It even turned a shade green, when an atte, doing her morning tulsi-katte rounds with MSS for background music, stopped for the cameras and impatiently said, "Oh is that all, my sister in law's grand niece got married to an American. Actual one you know; white skin, golden hair, blue eyes, with names like The Beatles and Simon and Garfunkel."

It also came to pass at some family functions about how our big Doddappa's response to the news was to look up about 10 degrees, between Keshavaaya svaaha and Madhavaaya svaaha.
What a perfectly undesired anticlimax.

How did we get to be thus?
Us, the true pioneers of "Aaj se sochlo ke tere maa-baap mar gaye"-type disowning; us, the true followers of the tenet that goes, "Don't let your children get married to anybody non-Kannadiga, non-Brahmin, and non-SMARTHA".
(Who said it? Well, I am assuming someone great. But then, I digress.)
So, let's start from how it all was, and let's end at where it has, and more importantly why.

There was a time when hurried whispers would flow with the vigor of electricity through a marriage hall when, "Radha atte, did you know Subbanna chikkappa's wife's nephew is married to a Madhwa Brahmin (whisper gasp) and they are Yajurvedis (whisper ayyo) and they speak Telugu at home (whisper scream)". And thus it would circulate, from Kanjeevaram to Kanjeevaram, from Mysore silk to Mysore silk, so by the end of the day, even if nobody knew the names of the bride and groom involved in that elaborate excuse for a lunch, everybody would know of the renegade that was Subbanna chikkappa's wife's nephew.

Then of course were the legendary horoscope mismatches.

Of the girl belonging to Rakshasa gana, and our boy being of Manava gana, and how she would eat him up; of the unfortunate girl of Ashlesha nakshatram who had to be betrothed to a family without a mother-in-law, and they found none for her; or of the couple who had the perfect horoscopes (28 points. Score!) but had to not be married because there was a possibility of their child suffering a fall seven years hence. Some Shani or Kuja influence or something. Tsk tsk.

So, there it was. Perfectly normal situation, with the Ontikoppal almanac deciding which side we would go to bed to, and at what time we would sip the morning coffee; with MS Subbulakshmi reverberating every morning on the RED National Panasonic stereo, egging Rama on to get up and kick Maareecha-Subaahu's collective butt.
But, that was the calm before the storm.
The storm came to the tune of tring-tring.

"Hello?", amma said.
"Hello, S chikkamma", said cousin from the other end.
"So, how come you remembered this fat aunt; what an unexpected surprise (sic). You never call for no reason, so go on tell me whatitees?"
"Err, I am going to get married. That's what mummy wanted to tell you last time she had called, but she couldn't get around to saying it, because you started discussing the new serial on E-TV, and then the recipes for chakli, koDbaLe, and then the design patterns on your new sarees; and also because she couldn't bring herself to tell you anything"
"Oh shut up, but this is so exciting! So, is the girl fair, well-read, Kannadiga, Smartha-Brahmin, of agreeable Gothra-Nakshatra-Gana, with a software-engineer brother in the Silicon Valley?"
"Erm, no"
"Then, in the UK?"
"Erm, no. The girl is fair and well-read already, but when I fell in love with her, I forgot to ask her nakshatra and gothra"
"Oh God, go on"
"She is not Kannadiga, she is Bihari"
"Huh!"
"She is not Brahmin"
"HUH!"
"Her G-N-G, I don't care about, as also her brother. I couldn't care less if he was from Silicon Valley or Diagon Alley"
"Oh good lord of Tirupati, what is happening! And her brother is diagonal? What do you mean? Not straight?"
"Jesus, he's not gay"
"What is gay?"
"Nevermind."
"May be this is what a heart attack feels like."

(The next family function, needless to say, was filled with conversations about the apostasy. "Bhojpuri? What is that, something like Pani Puri?", "No ma, they are some kind of sarees no?", "Eyy, isn't that Manipuri?", "Then what is Bhojpuri?")

And thus crumbled the cookie. The first "close" cousin to have gone "astray". There have been of course pioneers before and after him, for what is the Mile sur mera tumhara-isation of our pure-bred Kannadiga Brahmin family.
There was the bride from the "lower caste".
There was the distant cousin who got married to a British woman.
There was, of course, the Madhwa Brahmin girl (Amma said, "Now THIS is sacrilege")
Much before, there was the very distant relative who got married to an Australian, had multiple children (to satisfy Australia's craving for human population), and even named one of his children a hybrid name - Joseph Narasimhaiah!

So, thus thawed this obsession with the caste, sub-caste and the sub-sub-caste. Although it does rear its ugly head on the rare occasion, for the most part, our family has ceased to be the epicenter of religio-seismological activity. Which is why the Punjabis, the Biharis, the British, the Australians all exist under the all too albatross-ian wings that is our family.
We are looking for some west Indian representation though, no not the cornrows and banjo variety, but the Marathi-Gujarati kind. Dhokla and Puranpoli would be nice additions to our multi-cuisine accustomed palate. Sarson da saag, we are hoping would be nice.
As for my own brother, he is free to take the plunge with anybody, I guess. Caste no bar. Harijan, Girijan, Mahajan. Anybody.

That leaves me.
Since I am SO into shock-and-awe, this kind of tepid reaction is SO not done. I am looking for announcements that can still make them go "Ayyo, ayyo, ayyo."

May be I should tell them I am gay.
But then, they wouldn't know what that is, and on being told what it is, they wouldn't believe it and say, "such things happen only in America", and if I insisted even then, a havan, of course. Nothing stands the wrath of the fire god, no, not even homosexuality.
So, that won't go down too well.

Or, may be I should show them a picture of Venus Williams or better still, Cher (pink-orange wig in place), and say I am actually attracted to her.

Or may be, you guys could come up with things I could tell them.
Hmm.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
P.S.: In case of some cousins who might read this (although the possibility is remote), I love you all. You make life worth living. World peace be with you.

P.P.S.: Despite what I might tell you, my family completely over-reacted, with one even citing old Kannada film dialogues for effect. How I wish they behaved like I wanted them to. I am just too liberal ya, whattodo.

P.P.P.S.: THIS IS A FICTIONALIZED ACCOUNT. Shh.

A Short Story About Love

PumpkinPie, SweetyBootyCutiePoo to his mother, he was just Fatboy in school. Golu, HumpDump, Door No.88, on different days, among different friends.
School is school; and fat boys are fat boys. They get the taunts, the nicknames, the occasional being-pushed-into-mud, the not so occasional "Miss, Golu farted", nothing out of the ordinary.

When his classmates found that he had no intentions of rising to any gibes about his fourth chin, or the way a fold of his knickers seemed to be buried within his buttocks constantly, they simply left him alone, contenting themselves with the poem most schoolchildren knew, about fat Mr. and Mrs.88.

And this, suited him excellently.

It had been six months since he had moved schools. The last one showed him the boot citing 'Incompatibility with school rules' and in a post script the Transfer Certificate added, 'Adjustment problems; uncontrolled rage'. All because he jammed a classmate's head between the wall and the bench, when the poor boy asked for place to sit next to him.

"What sort of a school is this? Four children to a bench! And you call yourselves an International School! Which country, Rwanda?", his mother had fumed at the Principal.
"Madam, you don't understand, the other children are afraid of him", the Principal tried his most diplomatic tone.
"Afraid? Let them be. Let them cower under their seats, and turn out just like you. Look at you wuss, sweating all over like a pig before slaughter. Here, take this napkin. And do go shopping today. Who knows, you may even grab a pair", she had screamed, her face looking redder than her Banaras sari, leaving the Principal's face grayer than his jacket.

For all her bravado, the ashen faced Principal sought his revenge with that spleen filled Transfer Certificate. The conduct and attitude column seemed like, she cried, "an excerpt from Jack the Ripper's diary, and this is just a well-fed 9-year old for Christ's sake!". But then, giving up was never her thing.

The revenge however paid off. She found no school that was ready to take on her rather big, not to mention rambunctious bundle of joy.
School after school, no after no.
Three months, about twenty schools.
The peering, ever-scrutinizing gazes of the school heads, and their eventual refusal to take him in made her haughtier initially, disconcerted her five schools later, slightly unnerved her a few more schools later, and by the twentieth she was convinced there hid Satan under that Farex baby exterior.

Then started the third degree.
The beating. The morebeating.
The yelling. The toomuchyelling.
The giving little food. The giving toolittlefood. The giving no food AtAll.
The last worked. Like a charm.

So, four months and twenty three reluctant schools later, the arrogant mass of lard had been shaped into being a being of silence, of passivity, of MindingOne'sOwnBusiness; with a much drilled into credo of "Chuppee". The great story that would be recounted many a time by local mothers as The Chupping of the Thupper.

And this suited him excellently, making him realize the joys of non-alignment, of being the audience.
Reduced, and muted; ostracized and ignored.
Unashamed, accustomed to a solitude of a new kind, he began to enjoy his near-invisibility. From his position at the edge of the school and the school's life, he wrote postcards to himself, taking vicarious pleasure in the activities of those around him; quietly celebrating the rise or fall of this or that playground emperor, or the examination debacles of a particularly unappetizing classmate, or in one case, peering through evidently inefficient Venetian blinds to discover the sweaty tandem functioning of the ayah and the gamekeeper - ah, the myriad delights of the spectator; ah, the proximity a pair of opera-glasses could bring; ah, the webs of stories weaved in whispers.

But he remained silent through it all.
Amused, but quietly.
But then, how long can one keep that thing which is innately theirs suppressed? For instance, could this author ever refrain from using long clauses, and thus longer sentences?
Could the bully ever be content with solitude? Could the threat of being not fed Krunchy Krackers hold out for that long? If not bash up people, as he was wont to, was he not tempted to even attempt human contact?
This is against all acceptable 9 year old boy behaviour. The author didn't intend him to be thus. There needs to be some action taken. I can't possibly make my protagonist feel above regular human emotions. Reformed bullies have emotions too. Haven't we seen that in enough and more Hindi films?
So...


(The author, that is I, likes drastic changes, because they are well, so drastic, and because sometimes they are needed when met with a cul de sac.
So, here is one such drastic change.)

He is bored. Yes.
He, our hero, our fatboy erstwhile-bully-now-silent-to-the-point-of-being-silly, has gotten bored of his opera-glass ways, and longs, much like the Charulata he never knew, for the comfort of human beings, for the simple joys of playing tic-tac-toe that the other kids seemed to like so much.

He is bored, he is bored, he is very very bored, and pleads with the author to deliver him from a life so young, but so scarred, in succession by a bully history, a bullier mom, and now a fully dull solitude.

(The author considers, reconsiders, and comes up with what can be the only satisfactory remedy)

DEUS EX MACHINA.

Enter girl. Girls, the cause and solution to all men's problems.

Enter girl. Saturday. Hero still bored. No uniform day. Thrown his opera-glasses. Pink pinafore skirt. Sulks at the edge of the compound. Purple little purse. Catches sight of pink-purple blurb. Who is that? Twiddles thumbs. OH! That boy! OH! This girl! He seems sad. Why is she here? Wonder why he is the quiet sort, and always with those binoculars. God, the girl is always yakking, and always adjusting her hair. What's his name, I've forgotten. What's her name, I don't remember. Must be Fatty, ha ha. Must be Pinky, HA HA. May be he has seen where my hairband is. Oh god, here she comes.

"Hi", she said chirpily, extending a warm hand, wiping the hair out of her face, what with the hairband missing.
"Hello", he tried swallowing the tennis ball that seemed jammed in his throat, wiping the fat sweaty palm on his khaki knickers.

Solitude, shmolitude.
He had found his first crush.

(The protagonist is glad that the author endorses time-tested cliches. As for the author, he just likes happy endings.)

Jana Gana Mana.

If the media hyperbole over India entering her 61st year of independence has resulted in anything besides people denouncing the Emergency all over again, it has been to make me realize how much I love the National Anthem. Many people have written about the anthem, written beautifully needless to say, and I thought it would be hubris to add to the set of distinguished posts.
But, despite myself, I am.
I listen to the re-released album Jana Gana Mana and stand so stunned at the various unbelievably beautiful interpretations of the simple melody, that I brought myself to write about them. (This, when I had decided that this space would be for flippant discussion over things that don't really matter to any of us.)

Drawing artistes from across the country and her various forms of music, the album is, as was intended, an amalgamation of all things musically patriotic, or patriotically musical. Every Lata Mangeshkar is represented by a DK Pattammal; every Bhimsen Joshi, by a Balamuralikrishna.
Each showing to us, using the same swaras, the same taala, the same words and the same bhaava, all that is diverse about their chosen streams of music, yet proving to us all too conclusively that Jana Gana Mana is the great unifier. Note how each of them interprets even the smallest of murkis differently, sounding so different from each other, and still sounding so alike.

I get gooseflesh when I listen to that great doyen, part of the female trinity of Carnatic Classical music, DK Pattammal singing the ode to Dispenser of India's Destiny; or when Lata, that picture of greatness, negotiates the high note of Jaya he, when she was a ripe 70.

The tune itself is very simple; based on Bilaawal/Shankaraabharanam (wherever your affiliation lies), raagas that have been used so often in popular film songs. Yet, with this song, it evokes something so dormant in most of us.
I am not a very patriotic person, if jingoism is what is construed to be patriotism these days. I do not end a speech/performance on stage with a Jai Hind, or stick a plastic tricolour to my bike on Independence Day, or insist on standing up while the national anthem plays. I do not.
But this song, much cliched as it sounds, makes me very proud. And very happy. It makes me want to go back to school and sing it out loud with hundreds of other kids, each one holding a pitch ranging from A to Z and then some.

While being in school, singing the National Anthem, 'wasting' 52! seconds seemed like a ritual as dreary and ill-gotten as getting the school diary signed, or wearing polished shoes, or attending Moral Science classes. It had been over six years that I had last sung the National Anthem before the TV invasion of the anthem happened, and since then I must have sung/listened/hummed it enough to make up for all the lost years. May be it is the innate pride over how far we have come since 1947; since the day when a Line killed millions, fractured an entire geography, and threatened to put the subcontinent back to the days of uncertainty, despite the 'independence'. And look where we are today! If this isn't a giant leap for mankind, little else is. Agreed the country still has the corruption, the dowry, the redtape, and the works. But, if we have achieved as much as we have in as little as 60 years despite all these impediments, imagine what the Indian spirit, alive in every one of the billion, could achieve in the next 60.
We, as the citizens of the country, are in that sense, the true Dispensers of India's Destiny; and I am inclined to believe that Tagore thought of this very thing while he penned the anthem.

As Independent India turns a glorious 61, glorious visions of the future hold me in thrall. And I stand an excited spectator in my little corner and watch the spectacular symphony as it unfolds, note by note, movement by movement, over the whole of the country.

This got too pedantic, I know. So, I stop.
You, all of you, go listen to Jana Gana Mana, or better still, sing it out loud.
(It doesn't have to be Independence Day to, you know.)

Did we all grow up too soon?

It was not the first time that my wonder on wheels had thrown a fit. So much for nomenclature, that wondrous contraption on two rickety wheels is hardly a 'Sport'.
For the third time in as many months, my Hardly Davidson (control that smirk you, my friends thought that was funny. Okay, used to. Three years ago) was having a flat tyre, bad brakes, and was generally being a bitch. And so, I was making a Tughlaqesque journey, with much panting, to the mechanic's.

As I sat there waiting for Salim/Javed/Naved to be the desi Fulliautomatix and leave oily fingerprints over beloved Lalchhadi, I had all the time to indulge myself in an activity I like doing best. Watching people. Watching people do stupid things. Okay, judge me all, watching people do stupid things, and then laughing about it. I did quite a bit of it, the watching I mean, considering that the mechanic and his minions have their ways of making you want to fall at their greaseful feet to get your sulking bitch to move again. Disgraceful. Which was fine. For, there came to focus the first Oh-dear-lord sight of the day.

[I urge all my fine readers of refined sensibilities to cast an eye on the hoi polloi, (populating streets of Bangalore that aren't called Brigade Road/MG Road/Church Street), and to keep it cast thus for a while, for they present to you sights of unimaginable wonder, at least to the middle-class, Brahmin, prude self that is mine.]

Here in this dingy by-lane of a dingier locality, turning more incredible by the minute to my incredulous self, I sat watching in wonder, (with my jaw sweeping the grease off the floor might I add), a young impressionable boy and a younger impressionable girl walking together arm-in-arm, hand-in-hand, very much in love and evidently making no efforts to hide it, what with the loud squeals of laughter that seemed to work by a metronome of once every 6 seconds.
Now, despite being a self-declared prude, I am strangely tolerant to public displays of affection; mostly because of the sheepish looks on the faces of the people involved, and what-the-hell, the first few days of being in love are something else.
The aforementioned incident of les inseparables, would in perspective, seem entirely much ado about zilch, except that the Agapornis taking flight here were no more than twelve, and in their white and blue school uniforms; tie-belt in place. What's more, our little Romeo here, with facial hair sparser than penguins on a Bangalore street, was marking his trail with frail, yet perfectly formed smoke-rings!
Hello? This is Bangalore? was what my dominant parietal lobe trying to articulate, but got waylaid into doing the -
Dekh tere sansaar ki haalat kya ho gayi bhagwaan,
Kitna badal gaya insaan
- routine.

Which was just as well, for I felt a hand tap on my shoulder and a girl's voice ask, "What problem?".
Now this was our mechanic's minion, Khaled (close enough), Chhotu for obvious reasons. Barely 4 feet above ground, he got to working on Laalchhadi, like the little virtuoso, that all these mechanic shop children somehow always are. He told me that he was seven, and that he earned for his entire family; being the second eldest in a family of six children, the responsibility of feeding many mouths rested on him too.

I was taken slightly aback, I admit. Within a span of ten minutes, I had seen two situations as different from each other as South India is from the North, yet strangely held by a common thread. I couldn't help but wonder, that whatever may be the reason, we as a generation, as children of the new century, grew up too soon.

Theorizing like Socrates (ah, the pseudo me), I rode back home on the Khaled-ized Laalchhadi, to a surprise as pleasant as any. My brother, merely Four Seasons wiser than me, was placed in a software company (where else?), and would be a taxpayer at tender 21. And it seemed like only yesterday that he cried like a baby without a rattle, when he got less marks in Physics in Class XII. The whole growing up too soon brainwave only got stronger. If thousands of years hence, a Hawking sort (without the Lou Gehrig, of course, 'cos medicine would have conquered everything by then) wrote "A Not So Brief History Of Time", we'd be chronicled in the palimpsests of time as the generation that paved the way to growing up too soon.
Whatever may be the circumstances that led to it,
whatever may be the socio-technological reasons for it,
and whatever good or bad came of it,
we all did grow up too soon, don't y'all think?

My Bollywood-esque reverie was broken by a rather shrill scowl. My kid-cousin, barely a year old, was throwing a fit at his mother for having given him the dummy telephone to play with, when the gadget of his choice was, but obviously, the new and gleaming mobile phone!

Beaming like the Buddha, I thought to myself, 'Well, he is well on his way.'


----------------------------------------------------------------------------
written about two years ago; needless to say, needs to be hemmed and hawed all over.

Harry Potter 7 Sucks (Succinct, eh?)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows?
No. Try Harry Potter and the Deadly Hollows. (the depth in the plot is astonishingly hollow)

If you think this is bad writing (which it most undoubtedly is), i suggest you read the seventh installment of the Harry Potter series, also called,
Crappy Crapper and the Craply Crap-lows.
Farty Farter and the Farty Fartows, or
Harry Potter and the oh-my-god-this-book-sucks-so-much-it-should-either-replace-Linda Lovelace-or-be-the-face-of-Whisper.

You get the hint. Subtlety has never been my thing.
(Referring to excrement is, one would think)
(But, that's for another day)

Now, this book.
The most awaited book in all of known human history. And rightly so. Not for a moment do i grudge JK Rowling the fame she has achieved, or the anticipation which was associated with her last creation in the series.
The place she told us about, the people she introduced us to, the impossible magical things/actions she brought forth to us seemed close to our hearts, seemed terribly enjoyable, and most importantly seemed believable. So much so, if somebody told me Hogwarts exists in some far corner of Northern England, i would believe him, and lament my not getting an envelope addressed to me in green ink, delivered by a tawny owl. I would.

In all my fairly extensive reading of fiction in English, it is rare that I have really, really liked characters enough to claim that I have figured that character out. Franny from Franny and Zooey was one such.
The only other such character was Professor Dumbledore; the character exuded so much aura, so much positivity, so much sureness. It is my firm belief that Dumbledore was the best character JK created.
His character being reduced to a shadow of his actual self, and casting doubts on his impeccably infallible moral fibre is the stuff literary hara-kiri is made of. This one, being one of the many reasons why I think this book was not written by JK, and was in fact ghostwritten by Madonna.

(Aside : skip if you don't have the time.
My love for the series, like most things, has an intimate personal angle. I was 11 when Harry was 11, 12 when he was 12, and so on. People have variously described me as scrawny, very thin for my age; and my hair as jet black, ALWAYS unkempt and long; also, that I have an almost pathological urge to pick fights with stupid teachers. As any Harry Potter fan worth his uppu will tell you, these very adjectives have been used in relation with our boy Harry.
So yes, I assumed that I was Harry Potter. Oh come on, don't laugh. I am sure you had weirder delusions.
Aside to an aside : I sulked for a week when this stupid little Caucasian boy called Daniel Radcliffe was chosen to play Harry. But then consoled myself, blaming it on racially discriminating, culturally intolerant Britain.)

So now, hark all,

Reasons why I think The Book was ghostwritten by Madonna -

1. The book lacks imagination.

JK did not have a specific style to speak of, but what she did have was the ability to draw her reader into a world that seemed as impossible as it was believable. And all that, because a great part of her cerebral cortex was devoted to storytelling abilities. The mere fact that she has an age-independent fan following of millions is testimony to her incredible imagination that has surprised and stunned us book after book. This element of surprise, making us read with jaws hitting the floor is conspicuous by its very lamentable absence in this edition.

2. Everything CANNOT be a chance escape.

The Wedding, Escape from the Ministry of Magic, Escape from Gringott's, Escape from The Malfoy Manor.
Agreed Murphy rules over only us Muggles, and that Harry lives in a magical world, but come on, cut us some slack. Probability was a possibility JK never considered while writing the book. The probability here being Harry and his cronies going wrong, especially when the odds of that happening were astronomically high.
Also, by chance, there happens to be a secret passage from the Room of Requirements to Hog's Head, which by chance is also where Aberforth Dumbledore works, who by chance has bought the Dual Mirror from Mundungus Fletcher, who by chance would have flicked it from Harry.
Oh. My. God.

3. Blimey, what's with the Polyjuice Potion eh?

The whole concept of this Polyjuice Potion in the second and fourth books seemed neat, alright. Very skillfully used. The flipside to this book is of course that it is used with so much impunity that one wonders if water is the new Polyjuice Potion.
A classic example of imagination doing an Atacama, or Madonna calling the shots.

4. Expelliarmus sucks. So does Stupefy.

What Avada Kedavra is to The Dark Lord, Expelliarmus is to The Boy Who Lived. You have GOT to be kidding me, specially so when he has already done this Expelliarmus thingy in the fourth book, and if Voldy is the sly thing that we have believed him to be, he must have learnt his lessons.
Like an equally disgruntled friend put it, "To claim that a spell as elemenatary as Expelliarmus to be the signature spell of the boy who was destined to bring about the Dark Lord's fall, is asking too much of our imagination's credulity". And i could not agree more.

5. Characters no. Caricatures yes.

Dumbledore wore the cursed ring because "it was a mistake; i was being a fool". Huh?
Dumbledore collaborated with Grimmelwald because "I was young and foolish". HUH?
If establishing ole Albus as human was what she was angling for, she made a mistake, this Rowling. Especially when it is indelibly etched on our minds that Dumbledore was the one reassuring character, the one element of clarity, the one pair of deft hands that unravels thread by thread, every questionable consequence.
The very woman who created Dumbledore for me, also undid him for me.
I am very, very disappointed.

Snape. Severus Snape.
Why did Dumbledore believe in Snape as much as he did? Not explained.
And to assert that Snape's unwavering, never-ending love for Lily was the sole reason he risked his life to protect Harry, especially when half of Harry's chromosomes were a contribution of James, a figure he hated more than is physically possible, seems too much of a stretch to be deemed plausible.
And of course, as JK is wont to, he dies a maha lame death as well.

Ron Weasley. Always a caricature; never liked the character. This time, was deplorably depicted.

Sybil Trelawney. A character I rather liked. Her weirdness, her quirks, all of it. More so, because Emma Thompson added a little something to her character. And this woman Trelawney, who has devoted all her life to Divination, throws her treasured crystal balls in the end at the Death Eaters. How much more abysmally could one destroy characters, like literally?

The Dark Lord aka Tom Marvolo Riddle aka Voldemort.
He could well be called The Snivelling Mouse.
Just where was the terror he invoked, the kind that had me peeing in my pants, when he came to life at the end of the fourth book? Just where?

6. Dude, where's my explanation?

Sirius Black goes Behind the Veil, and is pronounced dead. (Nobody died a less eventful death) Luna Lovegood says, she can speak to her mother from beyond the veil. Where and when did that happen between Harry and Sirius?

In the King's Cross chapter, what is the wriggling creature seen under the chair? Is it the phoenix, or Voldemort, or a poisoned mouse dying?

Aberforth, our man at Hog's Head. Just HOW did he get into Hogsmeade, especially when Death Eaters have made it their backyard? Did they let him go scotfree, because he gave them some goats for otherworldly pleasures?

Explain the Death Stick. When Ole Dumbly dies, his wand is not snapped, contrary to wizarding tradition. But when Voldy breaks his tomb open, there is a wand, which is mistaken to be the Death Stick. Whose wand was it? How do the events on the tower correlate with everything else that happens later on?
I have my theories, as do all of you. But which is the right one?
(This is Harry Potter, and NOT 2001: A Space Odyssey)

What about the Giant troops that Hagrid goes to recruit?
Where is the French contingent with Madame Maxime?
What the fuck is Grawp doing in the book, anyway?
Where were the Trolls and other beastly creatures that The Order was afraid Voldemort would recruit?
Answer answer answer?

7. Who stole your Chekhov's gun?

"could ever have been friends with Gellert Grindelwald. I think her mind’s going, personally!
Lots of love, Lily"

“Just in case they’re --- busy --- and you get the chance ---“
“Kill the snake?”
“Kill the snake,” Harry repeated.
“All right, Harry. You’re okay, are you?”
“I’m fine. Thanks, Neville.”

This woman is great at foregrounding, she is. But fair ladies and dear gentlemen, read the above extracts, and hit your heads against the nearest wall, in exasperation.

The first passage was the torn part of the letter Lily had written. While the first part was shown to us, we expected deadly secrets in the other part, which we guessed was the reason why it was stolen in the first place. But turns out, no. Snivelly Snape flicks it because it had his Lily's autograph. Aargh.
Wipe your greasy parting with that love parchment, chump.

The second passage, a rather innocuous piece of conversation. Instructing a hitherto dudhead dufus to get rid of a deadly snake, which happens to be Voldemort's pet, and oh, which also happens to be one of the Horcruxes. And guess what, he does!
(Madonna, definitely.)

8. Mumbo-jumbo.

Things of convenience.
Room of Requirements.
Elf magic (which works in mysterious ways beyond human comprehension) moonlighting as deus ex machina.
AND,
About Harry being able to see what Voldemort is up to. This little window to The Dark Lord's creepy mind seems like the silliest explanation she has come up with to give Harry a sense of what to do next. Did Voldemort not use this window to his favour, when he tricked Harry into the Ministry of Magic?
Did JK forget her own creation of the whole Occlumency concept? Or that Voldemort was a master Legilimens?

Ron spoke Parseltongue by trial and error to open the Chamber of Secrets, as he had heard the intonations when Harry spoke the tongue. And as one would expect, it worked!

(I wonder. Just why didn't Petrificus totalus work when i tried it on a nag of a classmate then? After all, i have read all about it since the past seven years)


(The woman was definitely on wild mushrooms, grown with liberal usage of lead and mercury)

9. The Amar-Akbar-Anthony finish. Taaliyan, taaliyan, taaliyan.

Madonna got together with Manmohan Desai, Prakash Mehra, David Dhawan and Johnny Lever (for good measure) to write the climax. So, they came up with a Bollywoodesque twist to the plot.

Everybody comes out to fight.
There are comic interludes as fights are happening. There, the David Dhawan touch, unmistakeable.
You know, situations where during the climax, a comedian makes a fool of a thug, while sprightly background music happens. (Think Andaz Apna Apna, or Hum Hain Raahi Pyaar Ke)
Yess, like that.
Wah, wah, kwak-thoo.

The power of the Maa. (There, our man Manmohan.)
Molly Weasley can't take it anymore. Instead of Accio-ing woks and saucepans, she Accio-s magic she hasn't used since her first puerperium and knocks off Bellatrix Lestrange (that dreaded Death Eater who breathes Avada Kedavra), like she was no more than a gnome that came in the way of her gummyboots, while on a leisurely arthritic walk in her backyard.

*and now all hold breath for the top reason why this book sucks ass*

10. THE UNTHINKABLE.

What WAS that epilogue all about?
Joanne Kathleen Rowling, just WHAT were you thinking?

Harry Potter, the boy wizard, is 36 and a father of three? With the children being called James, Lily, and oh-my-god Albus Severus? (At this point, i could not hold it. Projectile vomiting. Damn, my monitor still shows stains)
(I cannot stop thinking of Harry as a middle aged man, with graying temples, a potbelly, foul English mouth and a bad gas problem.)

ANATHEMA.
Why did you do it, woman richer than the queen?
Why did you ruin Harry Potter for me thus?
Where was the magic?
Where were you?

Was it the money? Was it Madonna? Was it the mushrooms? Was it the movies? (Because, your writing seemed like you were writing a screenplay, never a story)

I am deeply disappointed. Why, it shows.
I am affected enough to write a 2000 word article while i am in a busy posting (Medicine).
After endless discussions with friends that think very similarly, I still cannot come up with an explanation for your undoing of Harry Potter.

To undo the undoing, you had better come up with an eighth book, with the characters not beyond 18 years of age, and with a preface whose header reads, "Blimey, i screwed up".

Until such a time, we live in hope, and pretend, despite all the media hyperbole, that the seventh book wasn't released at all.
Ah, the hope.

-----------------------------------------------------------------
For D, who hated the book too, but never shied away from discussing it for hours on end despite all the masochism involved,
and Rani Rosie, who probably hated it the most, and is currently (fervently) performing cleansing rituals to remove any last traces of the abomination that was the book, from her rather Stupefy-ed brain.
Love you guys.

Fragile

Have you ever known the feeling when you want to do something for somebody so bad that it hurts, but you just cannot?
Have you ever felt so inadequate that it makes you want to cry in helplessness?
Have you ever been in a place when people around you feel hopeless, but you cannot come up with anything to console them?

I have.
Since the past couple of weeks.

I am posted in pediatrics these days. And at times, i am depressed.
Why? Because,
Nothing in medical education prepares us to tell vulnerable parents that their child, the one sleeping on the bed rather blissfully, might not make it until long.
Nothing in all the extensive training braces us enough to stand the grief of a mother (who works 14 hours a day as a coolie, for a less than hand-to-mouth existence) who is told that her child will not survive unless she went through a surgery that costs 6 lakhs of rupees, a sum of money she cannot even imagine there being.
And nothing, absolutely nothing can make us strong enough to answer the question parents dread we would answer in the negative : "Is there any hope, at all?"

One understands that by choosing medicine we have chosen a path that requires us to be a lot stronger than most people our age. But it remains that we are just 21 year olds, trying to pass exams, going through lives as complicated/mundane/hormone-driven as any 21 year olds', and that we do not have any answers.
We might have cut open a dead body, but that's just where our bravery ends.
We might look dapper in white coats with expensive stethoscopes, but that's just where our being doctors ends.

A few days ago, i spoke to a woman whose son had been admitted in the hospital. The son was a cherubic 3 year old with cerebral palsy, the fault perhaps of a local daai, who took too long to deliver the baby, or whoever else's. But one thing is certain, the child had cerebral palsy. A fairly common condition in the wards, and sometimes very crippling.
This particular child had a global developmental delay, meaning all aspects of his development were either retarded or absent. A truth the mother has grown accustomed to be oblivious to. She says the child looks at her, turns his head toward sounds she makes, and smiles from ear to ear when spoken to.
The reason this story is throat-gulp inducing is because all of it is impossible.
The child has cortical blindness, his brains cannot read the images brought by his eyes.
The child cannot hear any sound, let alone those the mother makes. He merely turns his head hither and thither, acknowledging a world only he lives in, a world not inhabited by even this woman who has given her all for this baby, her only one, for the past three years.

What do you tell her when she asks you, "He is alright, isn't he?"
Do you tell her that the apple of her eye does not have the eyes to see you, or the mind to recognize you, ever? Do you tell her this and hope to have the courage to console her?
You don't.
We don't, either.
We say, "Please talk to senior doctors, we are just students", and whisk away from the place to find a strong pillar to punch our clenched fists against. Not because we are incapable of helping the child medically, but because we are incapable of even saying words that would comfort her, albeit momentarily.

Worse is a visit to the neonatal ICU, where little babies weighing as little as 900 grams, looking no larger than the palm of your hand, struggle it out with their small lungs, failing hearts and tightly clenched fists, praying in their own languages, 'please god, please, i promise i will be a good boy'.
With a hundred tubes sticking out all over their bodies, synchronized beep-beeps are all they have for company with the beeps more often than not, counting down their final breaths and heartbeats.

And you merely tap at the glass cabin that is their home,
and feel helpless.

This is a phase every medical student goes through, i guess. This is the stuff hospital dramas on TV are made of, since forever. Only, this is the only thing they get close to showing the truth about.

Over time, we get refractory to this whole phenomenon, i am told. It amuses, or perhaps angers some of my non-medical friends when i sometimes talk of death and illness in a matter-of-fact manner. It angers me, in retrospect, when i think of myself having become thus, where illness is a case to be taken, and death, a figure on the register. But this is the only way i know of being. The system has not prepared me, or any of my friends to deal with situations like these.
Death, to us is cessation of cardiopulmonary activity and non-reactive pupils, as opposed to it being a bereavement and loss of livelihood to an entire family.

If depersonalizing oneself is what it takes to make it as a successful doctor, then may be i will not be one. For, i still feel sad for a woman of 40, whose only chance of being a mother counts its last few minutes on an ICU bed.
I am not saying others do not feel sorry for her. They do, in all likelihood. But won't talk about it, because talking about it makes people think they are vulnerable. And "sissy". And that's anathema, but of course.

This post might seem a little too dramatic and serious, especially as it comes right after a feature on bombshells and thunderthighs. But telling this was essential, to me.
Until such a time as medical science progresses to a state where every patient is cured, we can only do one thing. Hope, and pray. (To a god whose existence, in the wake of all this, seems more than debatable.)

But then, that is all we an do.
Pray for the little children, and their families.
As i am sure you will all.

Heyy naati...

One of the more important aspects of psychological development, they tell us, is Associative Learning. (No, this is no nerd talk; read on, premature ejaculator). One of the better known forms of this Associative Learning is Classical Conditioning/Pavlovian Conditioning. You all know about the famous dog that drooled all over the place every time that man with a doormat for a beard decided to get the bell to go 'Tink!'

(Yes, that one.)

We, much like the dog, react by association. Much like the dog, or more perhaps, is the case of a friend who looks like she consumed an overdose of Organophosphorus poison every time *Johnny Depp* is mentioned. So much so, i expect a newspaper mentioning him, to be sodden wet in her hands. (Even if it carried his obituary.)
The same goes with most guys i know when mention is of Salma Hayek and Most People Her Kind. Keira Knightley somehow gets involved in all this too, but one must remember a good face can attract. Occassionally.

So, you get the drift. Association.

I grew up associating things as well, like most normal human beings.
(Only, my mother thinks i was some kind of a whizkid, hardly normal. Aww. Reminds one of that proverb in Kannada that goes 'HettOrge heggaNa muddu, kaTTkonDOrge kODangi muddu', roughly meaning parents love their children even if they turned out to be gutter scrounging ugly black fat rats. Awww.)
Mom's flaring nostrils meant, 'man, am i getting flayed today.'
An aunt meant, duck for cover.
A neighbor meant, get your handkerchief out/be prepared to hold breath for all the time he is around.
Among other such associations,

Silk Smitha meant, sex.
Disco Shanti meant, SEX.
THAT, is the point of today's post.

Silk Smitha and Disco Shanti and their Pavlovian Influences on my Understanding of Sex.

Now, for those of you with refined tastes and Mozart for lullabies, an introduction to these curiously named entities is, ahem, sine qua non.
They were my association to, er, 'leave the room'.
Why?,
because parents grudge their children a view of the greener, meaner side.
These two women, these two healthy buxom women, these two healthy buxom lustrous-eyed women, apparently, induced 'wrong thoughts' in our innocent-as-a-fawn minds. Bah.

Anyway, just WHO are these two women? Well.
These two women happen to be the ULTIMATE item girls. Divas in their own right. (Mallika Sherawat, go jump in a dry well, or get some more silicone.) They managed to titillate all of South India for more than two decades, with movies running solely because of their 5-minute show of cleavage and hyper-kinetic pelvic thrusts. And they did it with so much aplomb. Hideous wigs, godawful Amrapali costumes, Srirampur graveyard dance-steps notwithstanding. Every time they entered the frame, the atmosphere turned electric. Palpable sexual tension. No knife sharp enough. Sample a few.

Situation 1 :
A bleeding hero would be tied up in the cool looking multicolored dungeon of the pipe-smoking villain, with the hero's mother and his love interest generally thrashing about. Why? Because they could never get their figures to look half as oooh as our lady Silk Smitha's, who would have emerged from god knows where, in a blond wig and a red sequin nano-skirt, with her 3-inch long RED fingernails tracing the hero's amply ketchup stained pectorals. And, always grooving to a song whose beat went more often than not, ding-chakk-digi-digi-chakk.
And the lyrics, something like, 'Silku, silku, silku, mysooru silku silku...'.

Situation 2 :
Another less climactic situation would include Vajramuni or some such son of Satan trying to score with our lady Disco, also known as The Original Thunder Thighs. She wasn't much of a talker though. Most she was required to say was, 'hehehehe, youu youu naati baay, heheheheh'. And make those righteous noises, from within bitten lips, that went, 'haaaaan...haaaaan'.

Situation 3 :
Disco/Silk in a saree, flowers in head, child in arms, crying her sexy lungs out. And telling a patriarch type character that the father of the child was 'none other than your son', the hero. Just when you thought the world had wronged our lady, she'd appear before a vile-looking man and say in that husky voice, 'Baass, work over'. The man would then utter an all encompassing Muahhahahaha. The camera would then pan to the fiery eyes of a taxidermic cheetah, that being the chosen item of interior decoration of the 80's villain. (Have you ever wondered why? I have.)
And then for the coup de grace, by the time the camera could pan back to Disco, she would have cast her saree off like it gave her a bad skin reaction, and greet us in a characteristic two piece!

Other such situations convinced me almost hypnopedically that these women meant sex. (These two, by the way, were invariably called Rosee, Daali, or just Baybeee)
Every time i was asked to leave the room, or the channel was changed, my rather diseased brain would weave scenarios involving the two. The background music to it was always the 'haaaan, naati' which would repeat in untiring cycles.
I would think that Disco Shanti would cook also in leather hot pants and whip people before serving them. And that every one of her sentences would end with her biting her lower lip to the point that it bled. You know, like, 'The keyboard *hussky voice* i type on, is... black', and then bite her lips.
(Yeah, i was a rather prurient, gutterboy type in my childhood.)

These association type characters always leave indelible marks on one's psyche. Which was probably why i was rather sad when Silk Smitha died some years ago. Committed suicide, that one. Sad sad. One only hopes she is doing the 'heyy naati' routine to all those Indra type lascivious characters up there.

As for Disco, i hear she got married (to a Telugu villain, no less) and settled for a life that does not quite involve leather chaddis and whips (it perhaps does, who knows?)

And those of you who have not quite known the magic of these two, i suggest you stop by some regional channels sometimes. (It wouldn't give an abscess in your angrezi-fied kewl butts.)

They truly don't make 'em like these two anymore.
Yo Silk! Yo Disco!