My Name is Quark

For a change I quite liked Karan Johar’s de-Punjabification in My Name is Khan. Having learned beforehand about depiction of a person with Asperger Syndrome I waited for hamming like Black but found none. Rizwan’s interaction with his family and rest of the world was done well. Not for a moment harking on rest of the world’s cruelty to emphasize his suffering but letting us peek in Rizwan’s persona bit by bit. His disconnect with rest of the world was indeed touching and humorous at times. For me the movie as a work of craft went down the drains after Mandira lambasted Rizwan for her child’s death. Well there are more things in cinema (esp. Indian cinema) dear Blogger than are dreamt of in your philosophy. This is neither a movie review nor a piece of satire hitting at suspensions of belief. In fact I would like to take flights of fancies seriously. As I claimed for 3 idiots, popular filmmakers are pop psychologists more than craftsmen.

Protagonist in Hindi cinema have to come out of their skin and become a superhero and that is why movies like Rocket Singh, Shwaas stay in fringe and 3 Idiots, MNIK are blockbuster hits. An entire subcontinent can not rejoice in banalities of the characters. There has to be a transgression not a mere culmination. Greater the transgression, greater the accolades. Jamal Malik, a Muslim slum dog has to win the competition and not only but defy all odds to show weight of his transgression from slum to call center to millionaire. (I liked the movie for its democratization of slum as a knowledge society)

We had popular superhero comics so late in India probably because Amitabh Bachchan could eat a thousand bullets and still manage to save family, kill the villain and probably visit market to procure Aloo, Bhindi in between. Indian heroes were and are generalist specialists unlike Batman or Spiderman who have to take it as a full-time career. Unlike superheroes of occidental imagination which had their reality grounded within the comic (Clark Kent the reality of Superman, Bruce Wayne for Batman and Peter Parker as SpiderMan), Indian super-heroes had their imagined reality grounded outside cinema. Amitabh Bachchan, the Angry Young Man, savior of poor would reincarnate in different roles as Vijay and Shah Rukh Khan as the emotional, dripped in family values Rahul. An undiscerning eye would add tags like ‘playing himself’, ‘creating an image’, a mantle which Shah Rukh has taken from Amitabh Bachchan. Whereas Amitabh took a decade of pathetic movies and a game show to change this ‘persona’ Shah Rukh did not take that much time to veer away from dark hero roles (which carried misnomer of anti Hero) at the apt time. And MNIK might prove to be another switch.

As a ‘socially relevant’ movie it offers its own solution to popular fears. RDB promoted vigilantism, 3 Idiots found it in search for excellence, Munnabhai in Gandhigiri. MNIK tries to find solution of the terrorism within the Security Nation State, a state where social contract between nation and its citizen relies heavily on security. The movie roots on innocence, innocence of Rizwan who can not understand small talk or guile of smart people. Towards the end the innocence turns into itself and becomes a caricature. His innocence is used as a façade to prove his actions. It would be hard to imagine a suave, romantic, smart “Rahul” to go at lengths to convince the nation he is not a terrorist to get back his love, so let’s make him have a mental condition. The moment he gets kicked out of his house, the character of Rizwan Khan becomes Tulsidas without the renunciation and the movie fails to be a story.

SWOT Analysis of Bharatiya Sanskriti

समलैंगिक कुक्कुर और बाबा बामदेव का उपचार (प्रहार)

सुनने में आया है की विदेश की कलाकारा geri haliwell के कुत्ते समलैंगिक निकले! तो अब आधुनिक ख्याल के लोग कहेंगे इसमे क्या बड़ी बात है | पर हमारी संस्कृति ये सब allow नही करती | समलैंगिकता एक विदेशी विकृति है और हमारी संस्कृति को खा जायेगी अगर इसको रोका न गया| दरअसल भारतीय संस्कृति हिन्दी फ़िल्म के हीरो की उस बहिन के समान है जिसकी अस्मत लूटने को फिरंगी लुटेरे, भ्रष्ट नेता और दुष्ट गुंडे सदा कोशिश करते रहते हैं और बचाने वाले हैं समाज के तमाम ठेकेदार जो भारतीय संस्कृति को “बचाने” का कोई मौका नही छोड़ते | एक पुरूष दूसरे पुरूष से प्यार करे ये हमें गवारा नही क्यूंकि ये natural नही है | हाँ बड़े बड़े बाँध बनाना, सैकडों मंजिलों की इमारतें बनाना ये सब natural है | अजी साहब जब हम एक पुरूष और स्त्री के प्यार को ही नही झेल सकते तो पुरूष-पुरूष (या नारी नारी) का प्यार क्या चीज़ है

मैं सुश्री halliwell से आग्रह करता हूँ की अपने प्यारे टामी (या जो भी उन कुक्कुर श्रेष्ठ का नाम हो) को बाबा बामदेव के पास ले जाए | बाबा बामदेव जब अपनी योग विद्या से बड़े बड़ों को straight रस्ते पे ला सकते हैं तो क्या कुत्तों का योग से भला नही हो सकता? (सुश्री पैरिस हिल्टन यदि आप सुन रही हैं तो कुत्तों के कपड़े के बाद कुक्कुर योग धाँसू आईडिया है)| after all man ij aalso e sosal animal

Jai Ho!

Time: Diwali Night, 2008
Location: A student house in Zurich
Occassion: Diwali Pooja

So a bunch of desis, mostly techies studying in Zurich (sounds paradoxical right) gathered for a pooja. Now engineers with there last minute resourcefulness had not arranged for an idol of deities to perform rituals. Quick came the fix, a laptop was fetched, Google image search gave an appropriate pic to worship and even the Aarti was found on youtube. The pious students had their mind set on Goddess of wealth (with new found fervor from recent recession) and the Lord of Obstacles (much needed because of the impending, imminent exams). Eyes closed and palms folded in devotion (and job opportunity at the back of mind) but who remembers the lyrics (its the feelings that counts ain’t they and a little bit of melody) were trying to sync up with one other and the youtube Aarti.

The deviant mind chooses worst of the moments to deviate. A realization dawned on me, what if the building’s caretaker who knows nothing about Indian culture at all suddenly pops in the hall curios because of chanting sound. He would surely connect the dots and realize, “Now that’s why these Indian buggers are so good in Information Technology, they worship laptops!”

Pro Crass tination

Heavy snow beating down the city, awake at 0200 hrs, inevitable barrage of examinations (that word makes me imagine being under a microscope) of the author and he still finds reasons to procrastinate studies time and again. Few things you realize during exams:

* The den needs cleaning
* Garbage needs to be thrown out
* You need a nice pen even before you flip the first page so off you go to buy a nice one
* Can not work without a coffee

And now the blog.

Living near and moving around a wide variety of international students I have came across many non-Indian people with a healthy curiosity in India (rare are the chronic cases of Indophilia). Exchange of cultural exchanges ensues after acquiring acquaintance over different dinner or visit to a friend’s place. Some cliched and stereotypical topics always come up:

* Hindi Cinema (referred to the derogatory name: Bollywood)
– The heroine has to change 17 dresses in a song sequence
– Couple get teleported to and from Switzerland instantaneously
– Couple break into song n dance at the drop of the hat

Now to this I do not have any answer, this is an existential question. How the hell can a fish tell a well frog why is sea water salty hence I can not explain why Amitabh Bachchan used to kill the villain after eating all his bullets.

* Indian Food
– spicy
– the better ones might know : chicken tikka masala, naan, biryani
– weird non vegetarians : pork, beef, fish, eggs (theoretically 2 raised to the power of 4 = 16 combinations)

* Kamasutra
– No they do not teach Kamasutra at school there would be a riot if it were to happen
– No every Indian is not an expert in it
– AFAIK it is not a manual to achieve the big O (frankly told to a couple who gave a knowing smile to each other)

* Gods
– Yea there is a plethora of Gods in India
– They dance, play, romance, fight, take human form and what not
– I know it is complex, probably you can do a master thesis on the list, for now take Brahma, Vishnu, Mahesh that will do

But what threw me off was one guy asked me about the mammilla (word changed for obvious reasons) song. Half baffled and half embarrassed I asked him to show it on youtube. I expected some sleazy rendition of a popular song or a bawdry parody but it turned out to be Sushmita Sen’s Dilbar Dilbar song which got Buffalaxed to mammilla song. The poor soul all the while thought text presented in the video to be English translation of actual lyrics. I had a hard time conveying him the actual meaning amidst uncontrollable laughter. India and Indians are indeed queer, quirky but we are yet to reach that state of what should I call, I am out of words, perversion, insanity, masochism?

After having a hearty laugh I recollected the real great time I had with my friend Hari who introduced me to the funniest of all Indian Buffalaxed songs: Benny Lava quite a while ago.