TV pe ajkal...

Let's talk about TV. Specifically, the Hindi shows, because I have no idea whatsoever about other languages' and would like to refrain from generalizing. 

I have a few questions, for which I try come up with some sort of answers. 

Firstly, I wonder why there are no shows about government, bureaucracy and politics? And before you say, "hey! who wants to see that?", let me tell you about a show named "Ji Mantriji". It starred Late Farooq Sheikh as the Minister and Jayant Kriplani as the Secretary of his department. This politician-administrative officer duo were part of a satirical sitcom that had political plot-lines and was filmed in front of live studio audience, aired in 2001. That, right there, has it all. Before the advent of Social TV (use of social media for and with TV), the only way to gauge real-time reactions of the audience was by filming in front of live studio audience. Also, the show had everything from SAARC and Commonwealth to everyday challenges and achievements of our administration, in a light hearted manner.

Still, if you are like, "dude politics is not my cup of tea", tell me, are you a fan of American TV shows like "House of Cards" and "Scandal"? There you go. They may be of different genres and have brilliant storyline and actors, but they are political dramas. And just to reiterate, "Ji Mantriji" had brilliant storyline and actors. 

                                                   
Next, why don't we have any talk shows? Not the ones on news channels. We did/do have "Koffee With Karan", "The Front Row with Anupama Chopra" and "Rendezvous with Simi Garewal". But they're mainly cinema-centric. Where are the all-round entertainers like Shekhar Suman's "Movers and Shekhars" or "Surabhi" hosted by Renuka Shahane and Siddharth Kak? The former had a monologue on popular events/happenings of the week, loaded with puns and punches and fun interviews of actors, musicians, sports-persons and leaders alike. While the latter was a cultural show with music, art and quizzes, and was featured in Limca Book of Records for receiving the largest measured audience response ever in Indian TV history. As someone who has an appetite for all this, today I have no desi option, but to tune into the US exports like "The Ellen DeGeneres Show", "The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon" and "Late Night with Seth Meyers". 

And now let's address the elephant in the room. The daily soaps. 

Two days ago, on 3rd April, it was 28 years ago that IAF Squadron Leader Rakesh Sharma had strapped himself in the Soyuz capsule to go to space. Our Mangalyan is orbiting Mars since 2014. We are the nation who has had a female President.  The biggest cultural export, Yoga, is from our country. All this and many more feats have taken India to heights and the world finally sees us more than the land of snake-charmers. 

And then Indian TV throws shows like "Naagin" and "Vishkanya" in our faces. I mean come on! Okay okay, the argument is that dragons and magic may not exist but we love "GoT", but please do you really think "GoT" and "Naagin" should be in the same sentence? LOL, I think not.

Things that I have learnt from our daily soaps are many:

• Be it day or night, the ladies have no bad hair days. Even when the protagonist wakes up from bad dreams, not one hair strand has moved. When I wake up, my head looks like the creatures of the night played tug of war with my hair. Also, make-up: same story.
• Family: Mothers-in-law are wicked witches. Husbands blindly love their moms. Or did not want to get married to their wives but didn't tell their moms as they didn't want to hurt mummy. The bahu, no matter how much educated, stays at home to do chores. The family has multi-billionaires, but it's bahu's duty to cook. And sweep floors. The dads have no say. Hell, they have no role. A bhuaji/buaji is always there to join hands with the dominating dadi in creating havocs for bholi saas.
• Every show has a character who goes to jail. Like our society is filled with aunties fit for imprisonment.
• Saree: Every lady sleeps, eats and washes in heavy sarees. Those kind that my mother saves for occasions like weddings. As a woman, I know the difficulty of handling a saree. And even if it's easy for some to flaunt, dhobi charges Rs7-10 per saree to iron it. So, who has all this patience and money? And vamps get to wear sexy blouses while the good girl has to put a pallu on head? 
• All shows start with a good theme. Evils of child marriage, single motherhood, a girl trying to pursue sports, etc. But everything boils down to getting married, saas-bahu and death-rebirth.
•  And people easily procure things like pistol and sleeping pills. Don't you need license and prescription for that? 
• The makers are not even putting any efforts to choose a title for the show. Play the retro hits album, choose a song and there is the title for my next show. Or an old movie. Like the iconic "Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi", where it all started, borrows its title from a movie "Saas bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi".

There is enough literature about how the 90s kids saw the best of cartoon shows. So I don't want to clutter the internet with more on that. 

Instead, I'll talk about the teenagers. Remember "Hip Hip Hurray"? Or "Remix"? Now we have sadder shows about relationships and infidelity, because these days school children are dating while us college/office junta is still single :P Remember robot "VICI"- the "Small Wonder" from the eponymous show? Now, we present to you "RAJNI"-the bahu, from "Bahu Hamari RAJNIKant". 

While I was growing up, MTV and Channel V had these cool VJs playing music on requests, solving love problems (beautiful Malaika and quirky Cyrus) and playing pranks (Bakra and Just for Laughs-Gags). Now there are as many music channels as the media houses, with no VJs. And that is because we have YouTube and Gaana.com and SoundCloud on our phones. So, poor music channels cater to TV viewers by reality shows. 

In the simpler times, we had "Antakshari" and "Sa Re Ga Ma", now we have have 10s of these, both for adults and kids. And dance shows- celebrity dance-offs, celebrity pair dance-offs, kids dance-offs, mom dance-offs... 

Mummy loved cooking shows and maintained journals of those recipes. Today we have cooking reality shows, again both adult and kids versions.

There is a lot more I would like to reminisce about, from spy show "Karamchand" to comedic "Shrimaanji-Shrimatiji", but in this age of micro-blogging I've already said a lot. But these two points I must:

1.    The only constant in Indian TV from then and now are the mythological and historical shows. They were addictive then, they are addictive now. It's good that Gods and our human heros like "Akbar-Birbal" still have an audience.

2.   There is Life Cycle curve for everything. The delightful imports from Pakistan like "Zindagi Gulzaar Hai" or the American TV series we all are addicted to- they all have a finite number of episodes, and a finite number of seasons. Reason- sometimes the story ends. This should be a lesson for our show-makers. If your show is good, you can get infinite re-runs, but please keep it short. 

Coming of Age

If one thing that higher education has done for me, it's my coming of age. As a fresher, MBA has been an extended B.Tech, and I can easily draw some looks for saying these two years have been more fun than those four years. 

As an under-grad student, going to college was the first thing that I did outside of my parents' love and care cocoon. I was lucky to find great room-mates and Kasturba Bhavan's mess food was not bad. I found a hang-out in Surat city's famous Kavi Narmad library, an easy time- pass in walks around the lush green NIT campus, an addiction of American TV series and a solution to all problems-college k bahar galle ki chai. Having day-scholar friends met rides around the city and home food. Engineering didn't excite me but college fests and hostel celebrations and student council were fun. Basically I was a kid trying to live on my own.

Then, NITIE Mumbai happened. Hanging out with ladies and gentlemen, three-four years my senior, has been an experience. These species have been to office, seen the world-some of it at-least and are not students. They are professionals. I got to meet an ex-Army man, a twitter celebrity, people who had good government jobs, a lady drummer, a girl whose dream's to be a Formula One racer, professional photographers, poets: both kinds-romantic and self-deprecating, those who always wanted to live in the city of dreams, the social media slaves, some slaves of their own expectations, people in love, people married. Yes, I met adults here. 

In an environment where classroom studies were as real as a work of fiction, campus so beautiful with green and a pond, nested between two beautiful lakes, located in one of the chic-est locales in Mumbai and housing hundreds of people who left their pay packets to grab a bigger slice of pie; I grew. 

Some takeaways

• Dad was right. Listening is more important than speaking. 
• Lord maketh every one different. Observe all his creations, for each one is a mystery greater than the Universe. Plus, it's fun to stalk hot-looking peeps ;)
• Don't just be yourself, be proud to be yourself. 
• We all need a high. Some find it in booze, some in books, some in friends, others in shopping, still others in themselves. We all get high.
• Cool things are often underrated. Case in point, NITIE.
• Post-placement, B-School final semester means every one is getting married. Yes these adults I met, many of them used higher education as an excuse to postpone their marriages, but in the end, their parents emerge victorious. Or, many of them were in a relationship and now have gotten a fancy qualification and a sexier job, so they are ready to marry their sweetheart. As a younger adult, I am not in this phase.
• I make good power point presentations :D 

Unleashed

As the college comes to an end, nostalgia is expected. But when you ask people to scribble in the Class of 2016 Yearbook, beans are spilled, the town is painted red, inside jokes come out, unheard of friendships speak tons in 100 characters, emotions are unleashed!

As is human nature, each person forms an opinion of others. Some you know inside-out (my GANG members are laughing at this double entendre), while some people are a 50 shades of surprise. Sometimes you read between lines and realize a conversation some x months ago in some y context had some z meaning. Whereas most of the times, you know where you got your hands dirty from and that your partners-in-crime are just airing your dirty laundry in public :P Even if you or your friends aren't involved, but your crushes are, your brain cells are so active you'll just read the entire book of testimonials and connect any and every dots.


You start seeing people in a new light. Like a guy seen as a man of few words is really an encyclopedia  on Rock music. Or a guy I knew as a tough task master, focussed on work work work, has a romantic side.

And then you see yourself through others' eyes. Boy o' boy! You and your close friends are the wild animals who have seen each other naked in the field (well, figuratively). They know your harkartein, they know your takia-kalam, they know your soch-vichar. And you too. So you are mentally prepared for whatever comes out of their "shabdo ki pichkari". And they too.
But when rest of the junta writes about you, many different chemical reactions take place in your "khali-dimaag-shaitan-ka-ghar" :P And when your friends read out stuff written for you, the "chamak" on their chehre only indicates a night long session of leg-pulling and assumptions and conclusions and predictions and endless laughter.

So in the process of creating memories, we create memories.

TV Review: TBBT Season 9 Episode 16

Title: The Positive Negative Reaction

The Gist: Bernadette tells Howard that she is pregnant, to which he freaks out. Boys try to calm him down and girls try to cheer Bernie up.

Key Points:

1. Even though Howard has always wanted to be a dad, it is natural that he is freaking out. Especially as it wasn't planned. (Though how she conceives is a fun story :P)
2. The men try to drink and celebrate and the women too (except Bernie, who now can't have her favourite sushi or hot tub dips too).
3. Drinks lead to some cool scientific brainstorming.
4. Sheldon; "Forget helium, you know what's a super-fluid? This fruit punch". :D
5. All the friends get together and enjoy a karaoke night to welcome the baby with their renditions of various "Baby" songs.

My Say: 

1. It seems that after focussing the first half of this season on ShAmy love story, the rest of the season would revolve around Howard-Bernadette's baby and the pregnancy related struggles and excitement of to-be parents. 
2. What's expected though is that now the writers bring back some geek stuff, especially when Sheldon's love life is sorted, Leonard's married track is boring and Raj is single again. I mean, in real world some scientists discovered a new planet. Sheldon and I agree that Raj should be digging that kinda stuff. 

TV Review: TBBT Season 9 Episode 15

Title: The Valentino Submergence

The Gist: Sheldon and Amy celebrate Valentine's Day with a "Fun with Flags" episode live streaming. Penny and Leonard do it by discovering that they are neither young nor have anything to do. Howard and Bernadette decide to break into their hot tub and this is what I'll talk about. Raj is Raj and finally breaks up with Emily and basically I am at peace now.

-ve points: Leonard and Penny track, which once was the fun core around the science stuff the boys were into, now is so repetitive, it's boring. I mean they are the stars so you gotta write some part for them in every episode, I get it. But they just plain bore me.

+ve points: 

1. Raj broke up with Emily. Finally. Because of the movie girl he met last time. As I suspected. The other girl didn't say yes. As I expected. Raj is single again. Let's see how this can-speak-with-women-without-alcohol-Raj deals with it.
2. ShAmy are back with an episode of Fun with Flags. It's Valentine's Day and Sheldon finds it the hard way that today the viewers would flag questions related to love and loneliness, not flags.
3. Howard and Bernadette are the only couple who make sense now. Their relationship has evolved so naturally over the years, it's real!
4. The couple decide to dip in the hot tub for Valentine's. What they find is a surprise in there.
5. Bernie has a surprise for Howie, which will change the course of the show. It makes sense at this point in their lives and I am excited to see what next.

TV Review: TBBT Season 9 Episode 14

Title: The Meemaw Materialization

The Gist: Sheldon's beloved Meemaw visits, 'to size Amy up'. It's Meemaw v/s Amy, people. In the side track, Raj meets a girl at the comic book store.

My Say:

1. In the classic girlfriend v/s guy's mother/grandmother face off, Amy doesn't knuckle under the old lady. Take that, Indian TV shows on 'working bahu' who 'tolerates saas ke taane, pati ke khatir'.
2. Sheldon stands up for his woman. And he understands that his Pop-Pop was a difficult man to live with. There are times when I miss the Sheldon of yore, when science and games ruled his heart. But it's situations like this, when Shelly acts as the wise one, that I continue to enjoy the Sheldon 2.0- the non-robot, human.
3. Don't get your hopes too up, Amy :P Sheldon gave you his virginity, he's not giving away his Meemaw's engagement ring so fast :D
4. Raj brings back those olden days where he would just see a girl and imagine about their kids and grand-kids. The last season had ended with Raj trying (and failing miserably) to end things with Emily because of her morbid fantasies. Whereas most of this season showed them doing just fine. Maybe if this other girl comes into picture, Raj can think through and sort his romantic life.

Movie Review: Airlift

" Sir, kucch mila? 

Haan, Iraqi biscuit, Klecha".

Director: Raja Menon

Starring: Akshay Kumar (Ranjit Katyal)
               Nimrat Kaur (Amrita Katyal)
               Purab Kohli (Ibrahim Durrani)

Recommended for: people interested in war-based stories or rescue operations

The Gist: Rescue operation of Indian-origin people residing or working in Kuwait in the Iraq-Kuwait war backdrop.

+ve points: 

A refreshing break from stories highlighting how the rich and affluent do not care for masses, or party all night in their Guccis and Pradas and un-real dance sequences in foreign locales.The movie had a hero Ranjit Katyal, a big businessman, who though initially wanted to flee with his family when the war broke out, stands up for his workers, their families and lakhs of strangers of Indian origin. This shows that people with riches and position should neither be seen as apathetic to society, nor should they give up in weak moments, if they can, in any way, contribute to society.

All the characters are so real.

• Ranjit- the character shows that 'rich' people with 'comfortable' lives are very valuable to society. It means a lot if such persons with the right contacts, excellent negotiation skills, business sense, an understanding of people, power and money and good amount of funds put these things to use in crisis situations.
• Amrita- the wife of rich businessman Ranjit, who is crazed when her husband won't flee but 'save' his workers and their families.
• Ashok and Kurien- other businessmen who much like Ranjit in the beginning want to escape and not get involved in 'social service'. Very real human nature. If we have means, we always try to save ourselves first and rarely try to involve ourselves in helping others. And it takes guts to not run away. 
• Sanjiv Kohli- a 'babu' in Ministry of External Affairs in India, who is not 'in-charge of Gulf division' and so wouldn't like to get involved just because some guy from Kuwait had Kohli's desk number. Again, human nature- why should I get my hands dirty when it's not even my job. The man though has a heart and does try to seek help from mantriji, other babus, aviation department etc. Another character which shows that educated civil servants of our country are not just super intelligent and hard working, but very valuable to society, if they have the will to get the job done.
• Air India pilots- outraged to fly civilian planes over war-zone, ultimately showing courage in this risky undertaking of evacuation. 

My Say: I cried all through the first half and the Tiranga in the climax put a smile on my face. The story was about Indian-origin people who had been living as Kuwaitis, but realize that Indians they really are. It made me be proud to be an Indian too. A good feeling, specially when Republic Day is round the corner :)