Play it Again Kishore!

"So what kind of music do you like?", the pretty young girl sitting in front of me asked. So far the evening had been a disaster. My credit card had been deemed unacceptable to swipe because of "network" problems and I was completely out of cash. I had managed to spill chocolate sauce on my favorite shirt. So finally here was a chance to impress her and sweep her off her feet. Images of a second date and many more thereafter began flashing through my mind. "Kishore Kumar", I replied confidently quite sure the answer would make me appear irresistibly mature. "Who is that guy? I have never heard of him before! I only listen to Akon and Katy Perry!” came the reply.

I can never quite place a finger on the exact moment when I started listening to "old Hindi songs". It was not a moment of epiphany but somehow a part of my consciousness ever since I can remember. Perhaps it flowed from the love that my parents had for these classics. I grew up singing along to "Lakdi Ki Kathi" and "Eechak Dana" and my mind flashes back to those days of pure innocent fun whenever I hear these golden tunes. For me these tunes have been steady companions accompanying me through life's ups and downs.

Maybe we just live in an age of instant gratification which demands inane lyrics and synthetic tunes. An age where everyone is in a mad race to be ahead. And in this rush we often forget the simple pleasure of tuning into a radio station playing these golden hits on a Sunday Morning and being immersed in melody. So have you ever been on a footboard of a train and listened to "Musafir Hoon Yaaron"? Or wrapped your arms around an equally drunk friend's shoulder and sang along to "Yeh Dosti"? Serenaded a lover with "Dekha Ek Khwab"? Been heartbroken and listened to "Chingari Koi Bhadke"? Then do you not fear that the legacy we leave behind for our future generations are pretty young things who have never heard of Kishore Kumar.

I sometimes think of how easy it would have been to tell her that I too like listening to black gangsters riding on hummers and beach blond divas singing about how they kissed other girls. And then it strikes me that I would have been condemned to listen to that same music and no amount of flashing eyelashes would have saved her from certain homicide. So I sigh deeply, put on my earphones and listen to Kishore Da's "Ek Ladki Bheegi Bhaagi Si" fill up my senses. And I try to convince myself that sometimes, just sometimes things do work out for the best.

AN EVENING IN BOMBAY

“Sorry I can’t meet you tonight..got some urgent work”. I looked in disbelief at the text message. Exactly 12 days ago when I came to know that I would be in Bombay for the weekend I became as excited as a two year old kid in a toy shop. I was visiting the place after a long gap of nine years and there were so many people to meet and places to discover. Yet at 7 pm on a Saturday evening all my best laid plans were going to pieces before my eyes. “Why don’t you take a local train to Churchgate and explore the area”, the advice of my colleagues Lalita and Sidharth came to my mind. As it turned out it was one of the best pieces of free advice I have ever taken!

So with Led Zeppelin echoing in my ears I decided to head for the nearest railway station. Luckily for me Bandra was just a short walk away. I purchased a return first class ticket to Churchgate and caught a fast local train. As the train blitzed me to my destination and I could almost see the other stations and passing trains blurring into streaks of light, it struck me that that the local train was surely the truest representation of the spirit of Mumbai. Like the people it was absolutely no-nonsense, had not even a moment to waste and most importantly knew where it was headed.

After getting down at the station I decided to take a taxi for Leopold café. Of course it had become infamous after the terror attacks in 2008 (the bullet marks have still been preserved) but I had always wanted to pay it a visit after reading “Shantaram”. I requested a table for one and from among the crowded tables I received a response, “Isko Idhar hi fit kar de!”. Unexpectedly I found myself sitting in front of a tall European and ironically he ordered for tandoori chicken and roti while I ordered for pasta. We had a good laugh about it. The ice was broken. As the beer flowed we soon began to converse and I learnt that he was a travel writer from France who had to cover the city for a magazine. We talked about politics, philosophy, books, wine and even football tactics! I only realized the time when the bill came. So after wishing him luck in his future endeavors I once again found myself on the streets of the city.

I decided to head for Marine Drive and on my way gorged on Bhelpuri and Pav Bhaji near Bombay Stock Exchange. After taking the turn past LIC and Air India offices the promenade lay before me and it took my breath away. Everywhere I could see towers of lights reaching out to touch the sky. I took my place amongst the countless couples cosying up to each other (receiving a lot of dirty looks in the bargain!) and just heard the waves dashing onto the breakers which seemed as if they had been randomly scattered there by a giant hand.

To my complete surprise I heard a voice singing “Maalish! Tel Maalish! ”. In this age of Lazyboys and Thai masseurs he had surely become extinct. But then I spotted him. The man made famous by Johnnie Walker in the song “Sar Jo Tera Chakraye”. I beckoned him earnestly and asked for a head massage. He got out his motley array of oils and soon began to work his magic. Coupled with the cool sea breeze on my face it induced me into a state of near bliss. And I realized that like any great organization the greatest asset of the city were its people. It was a place of remarkable energy and zest for life. A city which had no consideration of caste or creed and only rewarded hard work and talent.

What if I had decided to stay back at the guest house and sleep early (the thought did cross my mind!)? Would I have had a meaningful conversation with my pillow? Would the chilled impersonal air from the AC be as refreshing as the sea breeze on Nariman Point? Were my experiences a matter of mere chance or a reward for being brave and venturing out into the unknown? The song had warned me that “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke Yeh Hai Bombay Meri Jaan”. Yet when I had tried to be a part of it for one night, the city welcomed me and rewarded me with unforgettable memories. Salaam Bombay!

THEM BLOND HAIRED ANGELS : A TRIBUTE TO LED ZEPPELIN

It was a hot summer night and as usual I had tossed and turned in my bed for a couple of hours. Searching for a way to kill time I went out and switched on the TV. As the dark black screen gave way to the plaintive voice of Robert Plant singing the first chords of ‘Black Dog’, I knew something had fundamentally changed in me. I had been transformed into a rebel. It was as if someone had knocked off the corks plugged into my ears due to years of listening to beach blond divas in tight plastic clothes just by the sheer magic of their music. And that someone was Led Zeppelin : Them Blond haired Angels.

I was the quintessential child of the 1990’s brought up in a country that was just beginning to throw its arms wide open to the world. I grew up listening to MTV Select and singing aloud with my elder sister to Backstreet Boys and Boyzone. That was my introduction to “English” music as it was called back then. As years rolled on I started listening to Bryan Adams, which made children “cool” in those days. But when that moment of epiphany happened on my couch I somehow knew that my perspective of looking at things had been altered.

As the program progressed I became more and more entangled in the wizardry of those four magicians and when it ended I was on the internet within seconds trawling through their biographies. Within a matter of days I had finished listening to all their songs and from then on I graduated to becoming even bigger fans of The Doors, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, AC-DC and many others. Yet it was Led Zeppelin who had been the stepping stone to that golden generation of the 1960’s and 1970’s and shall remain the closest to my heart.

Ravi Shankar once said that a lifetime was not enough to understand the work of Rabindranath Tagore. Such is the sheer diversity and brilliance of the work produced by Led Zeppelin that much the same can be said about them. The drum intro of “Rock And Roll” and “The Song Remains The Same” are moments of superlative invention. They almost invented the art of beginning songs with a slow beat and then changing gears abruptly in the midst of songs like “Bring It On Home” and “Whole Lotta Love” and mastered it with “Stairway To Heaven”. Whether you are sad, happy, haunted, jilted or even horny, one can find a song for almost any mood. And name a genre of music be it Country (Friends), Rock (Heartbreaker), Folk (Bron Y aur Stamp) or even Texas Rockabilly (Hot Dog), Led Zeppelin left their indelible mark of genius on each one of them.

When Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, Paul Jones and John Bonham a.k.a Led Zeppelin began their journey could they ever envisage that four decades later, a young boy living in India could derive such joy from them. A year ago, as I sat dangling my legs on the footboard of a train taking me to Calcutta, the rays of the rising run had just begun to kiss the waves of Chilka Lake almost as if someone had lit a million sparklers beneath its surface. It was at that exact moment that the first riffs of “Stairway to Heaven” began to pervade my senses and I knew that I had found my ticket to divinity. Go find yours.

MISSING ON MG ROAD

Buried under a large debris of information in today’s newspaper I saw an innocuous little photograph. It depicted a bald patch of ground on which a bland signboard had been put up: “Property of BMRCL : Keep Out!!” . The caption casually mentioned that on that land the proud Plaza Theatre had once stood and now had been razed to the ground for the MG Road Metro Station. So you remove one of the iconic buildings on MG Road and replace it with a Metro Station. All applaud for Progress!!
A bit of history first. The Plaza Theatre was built in 1917 by Mr. Arcot Mudaliar who among other things also built the Bangalore High Court. The theatre soon rose to prominence among the soldiered gentry and also boasted of a wooden dance floor where young officers could woo their ladies. Over the years it screened classics like “The Roman Holiday” and “Gone with the Wind”. Yet today the nostalgia of happier times has been reduced to ashes and ringed by construction equipment.
One can see a pattern developing across Indian cities especially in Bangalore where people being in the mad race of gadgetry and technology forget the beautiful legacy left by earlier generations. Where heritage buildings are pimped into boutique hotels in the name of development or worse still are torn down to create monstrosities called malls which are then passed off as being beautiful additions to the cities landscape!! I can understand that the Metro will bring much needed relief to harried commuters of Bangalore like me. Yet that does that merit the wanton destruction of icons of a bygone era which reminds us of simpler times?
You may argue that change is unstoppable and the only constant. That the old must make way for the new. But take a look at cities such as Vienna and Prague where tradition has been blended with modernity and has even been converted into a successful model for enticing tourists. So what if the Plaza theatre could be converted into a museum with an auditorium that screens classic films and a small part of the Manekshaw Parade ground may be used to build the Metro Station. Perhaps the solution is too simplistic yet I am sure a better answer to this problem can be found. Else we might just have to dig deeper into our newspapers to find out what more is missing on MG Road.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/60785/ground-zero-plaza-theatre-m.html

ORKUT-YOU MUST BE CHIRKUT!!

"You do not orkut!!" exclaimed Aisha,the pretty young thing in my class,whom i had been eyeing for quite some time.

"Nope.", I replied nonchalantly desperately trying to hide my ignorance confused by the strange words that were emanating from her. Maybe it was a new beauty regime for metrosexual men or a strange new planet, yet why was she giving me this information.

"But you must open an account in Orkut so that I can send you a friend request", she purred.

Euphoric with the sudden turn of events, I hastened home to solve the "Mystery of Orkut". It turned out to be nothing more glamorous than a social networking site where you had to put up an online profile. Within a short period of time I discovered that my key to success was to temporarily suspend my moral beliefs. So works of Andre Gide and Marcel Proust became my favorite books even though i had never gone beyond the cartoon strip of my daily newspaper. Symphonies by Mozart and Beethoven were pieces of music that brought me to a "state of ecstasy" (as written in my profile), even though my family was treated to daily renditions of the latest Himesh Reshammiya hits from the bathroom. Was my ethnicity East Asian with dark skin or dark with East Asian skin? Confused as ever i ticked West European and since cheese is my favorite food item, I categorised my humor as cheesy.

My efforts of creating my profile were finally rewarded when i was "scrapped". No, as you might think I was not taken to a junkyard instead Aisha had posted a message for me on my profile welcoming me to her network of “friends”. Ignorant of the fact that the message could be read by anyone accessing my profile, I was surprised when the very next day my account was flooded with messages congratulating me on my new conquest. However the joy of enjoying my exalted social status was short lived. A quick check on the history of my web browser by my sister revealed innumerable visits to the Orkut homepage and she duly informed my father. He did nothing much except taking away my rights to sleep,eat and almost everything that made my miserable life a little better.

As i contemplate the meaning of a life condemned to text books and my sister tries to kick her new found habit of "orkutting", you might ask what became of the pretty girl who started it all. Last I heard she was going around with Vikram a "mutual friend" on my profile.

NOTE: The piece is actually an article written for the college magazine 2 years back. Thought I will post it and gauge the reactions once again. So bring on the bouquets and brickbats

Is Gandhi Dead?

“Birla House Going? Very near to station. I take only 15 minutes and drop you.”, the auto driver replied in what he assumed to be chaste English. Won over by his sincere effort to impress me, I smiled and got in. An hour and a hundred bucks later the edifice loomed before me. I felt angry for I had been blatantly cheated but I was helpless for I was in Delhi. I was lucky the guy had not demanded an extra hundred rupees. A guard was sleeping with his cap down over his eyes. I did not blame him for it was a hot day. Everything around me was somnolent. I went in with a sigh.

As my eyes adjusted to the dim surroundings around me, I felt a tinge of sadness. Here lay a treasure trove of Mahatma Gandhi’s memorabilia yet not a single soul was around. Except for one old man who stood in the far corner gazing at a charkha. He was short and leaned a little as if to take support of an imaginary stick. Something about him seemed familiar. I shook my head and approached him. “Did he really do all the spinning by himself?” I asked the old man. His brilliant eyes twinkled behind the spectacles as he replied, “Oh yes. Gandhiji believed in the fruits of hard work and the dignity of labour. Quite unlike today’s youth who demand things instantly.”

I was stung by his reply. “Oh yeah! Wasn’t he the one who took nearly 40 years to win us our freedom?”, I retorted. The old man replied in a calm voice, “Gandhiji helped us gain independence in a manner that has inspired many others. His principles of struggle based on truth and non-violence showed the world that war is not the only solution.” My eyes fell on a photograph of Gandhi with Jinnah. Egged on by a thought I said, “So how do you explain Pakistan? Gandhi just gifted it away to Jinnah”. The old man’s shoulders drooped and his wrinkled face became clouded. He replied in a sad voice, “Son, Gandhiji always stood for an undivided India and abhorred the idea of fundamentalism. However for once in his life he was defeated by the divisive forces of hate and power.”

I felt sorry for the old man but I could not resist and asked him, “Let’s face it. His values are of no use today. Everyone indulges in making the maximum profit by trampling over others. Who cares whether farmers commit suicide or tribal villages are burnt to the ground? All that remains of Gandhi is a portrait on our currency and a national holiday. ” The old man chuckled and replied, “You completely missed the point. It is only when voices of hate and communalism rend the air does Gandhiji’s voice of love and unity seem to be the only sane one. When corruption has become so rampant that we accept it as part of our daily lives, Gandhiji’s values of truth and justice shine through. Remember son, a Gandhi resides within all of us. It is upto you to heed that voice of satyagraha and ahimsa.”

My eyes were drawn towards another photograph. Gandhiji’s body was shrouded in white and surrounded by sea of people. How could one man inspire a nation to such great heights? How could his values still remain relevant even today? And then it struck me. How could I miss those sparkling eyes behind the full moon spectacles? I wheeled around but the old man had disappeared. I ran towards the exit. The guard was still sleeping. I shook him awake and asked him, “Did you see an old man?” He replied, “Sahib, you are the first visitor in two weeks. The heat is making you see things. Thanks a lot for disturbing my sleep.” I thanked him for his help and could not resist smiling at his bemused expression. I walked away. It was my first step on the path of satyagraha and ahimsa.

Inspired by a short story written by Ruskin Bond