The Punch-Line

Have you ever found yourself scratching your head, ridding it of creatures nestled there since the last New Year bash, wondering “WTPhug!” when you see a widely acknowledged tool cracking people up? Just why the hell is everyone splitting their seams and emptying their internal organs just because s/he speaks in a barely-funny voice? There’s not even a real joke in there, fuhtheluvvaShiva! In fact, we’re pretty sure you’ve had a moment where you said something totally off-the-cuff and suddenly, were assaulted with guffaws from all corners as if you’re the de facto lead in a crappy sitcom. Again, you’ve probably wondered, “but it wasn’t that funny...”

Why?

Here’s where we think we’ve figured out the answer: the above situations only occur when the laughers in question are people they or you know. No, no, our theory isn’t as simple or pathetic as “they know you, so they laugh out of the kindness of their hearts”. That’s just sad. We’re saying that they laugh because their brains have accepted the exhibited sense of humour as a valid source of amusement. Take news channels: India TV isn’t going to be leading the race in terms of credibility but we’re sure most of us would believe what NDTV reports; the mind has accepted the veracity of claims made by the station. For the insufferable pedants who read Murakami in their lavvies, who will possibly be unconvinced, here’s a little something. In ancient Indian philosophic tradition, the different schools had varying requirements for belief. Each school listed what it considered proof for knowledge and accordingly, each possessed different ideas of what constituted knowledge. Similarly, if a brain has okayed a certain brand of hilarity, then that’s the way it will be for all time regarding the person expressing it.

Now, for the cognitive centres to certify your wit as ‘Acceptable’ there is a process akin to college admissions, wherein your suitability for the jokee’s self and social image is gauged. This process of scanning you lasts for about fifteen minutes. Much like acceptance to college, once you’re in, you’re in. To be expelled from the ‘zone of funny’, you have to do something ridiculously drastic like be caught smoking weed in the loo. Oh wait...never mind. This brings us to the crux of this satvachan:

The Punch-Line

This is the graphic explanation of aforementioned process. With X being the amount of time being spent with the jokee and Y being the funniness of the joker, the shape plotted will emerge as a plateau, spiking up drastically within the first fifteen minutes and then flatlining till infinity.

This horizontal summation of your sustainable comic appeal is what we term ‘The Punch-Line’. The real trick is to ascend that pesky fifteen minutes with alacrity and elan, so that you’re locked in nicely by point AWESOME and remain a desirable asset in people’s personal and social schemes.

Now, ask yourselves this: how many times have you hit The Punch-Line?


DUE CREDIT TO: Jaideep Khare, BITS-Goa

FAQ (First Asked Question)

Anindya Shanker Mitra: You need to take into account the universal decay of information over time, owing to which, by my opinion, the point after the first 15 mins would form the peak, followed by a gradual decay upto some asymptotic value depicting the general value of funniness that you expect from a "funny" person.

OK, more of a statement really. But here's our official response:

This theory was co-conceived by an engineer from BITS-Goa, so we did take into account information theory and entropic decay. But when applied to general life conditions we have realised that the decline occurs only after external conditions are extremely unfavourable to the joker,in which case the asymptote (which'd denote 'potentiality') would become irrelevant - it's an extreme situation either way. The quality of jokes will invariably fluctuate but this is representative of a social percept. When using Math to explain society, one must make room for tweaking some science =)

IEW. Look it up dummy.

There exists a certain group of women who wear their brains on their sleeves.The intellectual elitist women. Let me go ahead and abbreviate that- IEW .

Look closely and you’ll find that the snobbish tag that comes along with being a member isn’t really unjustified or very much off base. If more than one self-assuredly intellectual female is in your presence and someone asks if Guantanamo bay is the new diet doing the rounds, watch as they glance at each other, one brief glance.If you catch it you should know that they’ve all mentally fist bumped or body-fived each other like frat boys.While being extremely subtle this sense of superiority holds much more weight than the superiority petty girls possess for being pretty/rich or whatever it is that makes girls feel superior to one another because contrary to popular belief it isn’t masking insecurities. Its just the tremendous self-worth that accompanies knowing of one’s being more perceptive , observational or knowledgeable than the rest of the lot. Unhealthy ? Perhaps.

Of course they respect and may like everyone but admiration is reserved only for their own kind.I don’t think society is quite ready for them though. They can’t stand a woman who doesn’t always care about the way she looks. Preposterous ! I have a theory that maybe, without significant meditation on the subject,some of them choose not to pay too much attention to they way they dress. It marks them. Of course they are completely unconscious of the effect it has on people, or so they say.I’ll bet they do know that it screams, “ I don’t care if what I’m wearing isn’t good enough for you, I’m so much more smarter than you comparing the two of us would be ludicrous.We don’t even fall under the same category of species.” And it does take a rather evolved male to enjoy their company. Men so disappointingly often like a woman who adopt every idea or thought that escapes their lips.Somebody who they’re sure will find everything they say or do staggeringly brilliant.

Try not to hurl your never-before-opened-textbook the next time you notice their hands sticking up in the air during a class. Or the slight smirk and broadening of shoulders (they can’t help it) when the teacher winks at them in that approving way . You want to get back at them ? This woman is invincible unless you can prove to her in some way that she isn’t as smart as she thought she was….or you weren’t as dumb.IEWs biggest fear, something they wake up at night drenched in sweat because of, is finding out that someone they considered vapid has been hiding a brain in their closet and will one day triumphantly stick it under their noses with those manicured hands. But every time they fear this will happen,every single time, Vapid will say something so utterly inane that all they can do smile . Yes , all is right with the universe.The pyramid of life-forms still has them cradled at the top.

Well, well, Wadia know...?

FUN FACT: In what can only be described as a shocking fuck-you to the Dewey Decimal System, Fergusson's (in)famous Wadia Library has a dirty little secret: a filing drawer labelled Ass-Bag. True story. Go check it out if you don't believe me. It's on the left as you enter. In bold, black letters.

Who the hell is in charge of this??

On the topic, I must plug our tres awesome librarian, Prof. Kamble. Who is so the shizzle that it's physically impossible to not be affected by his shizzle-ness within a 2 m radius. Be not fooled by his less-than-a-metre height. He is The Man to unman all other men, believe you me. Mild mannered Marathi manoos by day, supreme leader of the new world order by night. As far as conspiracy theories go, this seems about right. Within the labyrinthine annals of that big, decrepit building is housed the secretest society of geekzillas set to inherit the world. And Prof. Kamble is their master, commander and Yoda to their Lukes.

He even has a sidekick, that mousy little man who jumps to attention the moment Prof. K snaps his fingers. This chap knows every nook, cranny and crevice of that goddamned library. I've never seen him so much as blink when zipping to 'Buddhist Philosophy 300-320' or wherever. I've never seen him speak and if you so much as talk back to Kamble, a look of murderous rage appears on his face, like he's gonna hunt you down within these walls and bury you underneath a stack of books in the Sanskrit section, so even your bones won't be discovered.

Look, all I'm saying is: when the aliens invade the earth, I want Prof. Kamble on my side. He's not the librarian but the Librarian, attended to by the faithful Bookworm. He knows all, sees all and preserves all. Not just books but ancient wisdom now remaining only in the dusty backshelves of Wadia Library. I would not want to mess with him. I suggest you keep conversation to the barest minimum, do your business and get outta there pronto. Don't mention 'termites' at any point or you'll find that was the last thing you said in the sunny part of the library. Keep focussed on his plaid shirt and be nice to the Bookworm.

Ye have been warned.

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Womance and the Femily

So I'm totally drooling over Spock with a pal the other day. There's a pause and he says: "That's the ultimate bromance, man." And I open my mouth to agree when something hits me: a bromance? Like a brother-romance? The pinnacle of male homosocial relationships? That which is copiously referenced in How I Met Your Mother? Enough with the rhetorical questions already, I hear you say. A bromance is, to the uninitiated, the ultimate in man bonding. It is the closest that straight men will ever come to in their dealings with other men. It is the equivalent of a straight-male marriage, the BFF-ship to end all BFF-ships. And the examples abound: JD and Turk (Scrubs), Kirk and Spock (Star Trek), Starsky and Hutch (duh), Harry and Ron (Harry Potter), hell even Jerry and George (Seinfeld). But hang on, a bromance is a term confined to brothers, a synonym for the universal fraternity house to which all men magically belong. It's exclusively a male rapport.

Am I missing something here?

What about womance? Females share the same kind of bond, the same Three Musketeers code of friendship and the same sense of camaraderie that men do. Personal example: my two fellow bloggers and superheroines extraordinaire, Ab and Org. When we hang (and I'm mocked for this seemingly obsolete turn of phrase), I've always gotten the feeling that anything I said or did would be tolerated, protected, ridiculed to my face but never before anyone else and would actually be paid attention to with a deep mix of affection, love and the willingness to look past my many flaws. Isn't that what a bromance is? I can even crack completely inappropriate, ribald girl jokes with my coterie, rounded up by at least four other equally awesome ladies, exchange borderline romantic rejoinders and have everything accepted without excuses and apologies. There are of course traits absent in male friendships which exist in female ones, not to mention a special type of humour that women can share only with other women. I cannot be the only girl who feels this way with her gang. All women must surely respond the same way to their best friends, their femily.

And yet, one hardly hears a whisper of this in the mainstream media. Are there any truly enduring examples of female friendships in TV, books and movies? This question is the second part to the one asking where female bonding is honestly represented in all its glorious, kaleidoscopic brilliance. We have at least a million films talking about men and their friendships, - drunk, sober or high, adolescent or adult, straight or gay, black or white or brown or yellow - and practically none about female love. Don't say Thelma and Louise. I'm talking about a movie that doesn't have to end with the leads dying (*yawn* 19 year old spoiler alert), in yet another woeful dirge to female existence. I'm talking about an all-girl The Hangover or Superbad. There's no real reason why McLovin has to be a dude. Juno was probably one film that came close to hinting at that kind of youthful , 21st century affection when it showed Juno and her best friend discussing her impeding pregnancy (a quintessential girl thing).

So when will men wipe off their smug, sexist little smirks belying their belief in the fact that the only time women get together is to claw each other's fur? It's patent bullshit. And when will women get off their backsides and write awesome scripts about a group of women going on loco adventures, having illegal fun and strengthening their girl-love all the 90 minute way in? A chick flick that out-legendaries guy buddy comedies is what I'm talking about.

What say?

High Camp and Low Lives

I confess to being a fan of Bollywood schlockbusters: those awful, unholy strips of celluloid cobbled together by a sub-moronic team of 'technicians', 'artists' and possibly, an underworld financier or two. Oh come on, you know what I speak of, you sly savants of drek! You're all well-acquainted with these paragons of kitsch, these manufactories of mulch, the non plus ultra of neon...OK, I’ll put away the thesaurus now. What I meant to say was, through all of that hyperbole, that by gosh, camp is the shizzle. With the zeal of Perez Hilton and the agenda of Kim Newman, I’m gonna force y’all Bollybusters outta the closet and into the parliament of Cool to vote ‘aye’.

Just the other day I was compiling a list, on Facebook, of the top five films that I knew by heart. One of them happens to be the revered Mithun classic, Gunda. (To the pitiable ignorami, I recommend a look at TLV Prasad and Kanti Shah’s combined filmographies, a subsequent Sunday evening in and the metabolism of a bunny on crack). A friend commented on this choice, sputtering with disbelief, “But...but...I thought you had taste!” Taste? Excusez moi? Hold on there, buddy boy. Hold on, just a *generic profane interjection* minute! Where’s your sense of irony? I know just as well as anyone else that in a debate between, say, Pather Panchali and Gunda, the former would adjust its monocle, let forth a poignant aria about the simple tragicomedies of life and win the hearts of the audience, even as the latter grunted around uncertainly. BUT let’s have a proper tussle folks, an all-out, down-and-dirty bar brawl between the two: Gunda would not only own Pather Panchali five times over but fuhtheluvvaShiva, the trash talk would be insane: the kerchief-necked frat-ilicious jeers ridiculing Pather Panchali’s monogrammed blazer and loafers would be A-DOUBLE U- E some. Yeah baby!!!! Ringside seats to that one!

It is this sense of sardonic, silly and sweaty low-brow pleasure which causes a cult phenomenon in the first place. A brief overview might put things into perspective.

Almost anything that has spawned legendary appeal is either exceptionally good or excruciatingly bad. While the brilliant is often overlooked, in time it always finds its place in the pantheon of genius. The truly great will always be recognised and lauded, if not in its own time then in the time after; it represents all that is complex and confusing in our lives and worlds and as such, will be revisited by every generation and admired anew, its delights subtle and variegated, its assaults gentle and permeating. Next up is the usual fare that’s churned out all the time. In kowtowing to the gatekeepers of high culture, most well-intentioned rubbish is rejected and soon forgotten. There will be precious few lining up to remark upon these trite attempts to ‘entertain’ or laughably, ‘enlighten’. The majority of art falls into this category.

And then of course there is the really bad stuff that is rightly debunked by those in the know, but with its unabashed earnestness, wins the rest of us right over. Why d’you think Ed Wood is so the man, even today? Plan 9 from Outer Space retains the title of ‘Worst Film Ever’, with no dearth of audience at any screening. The film they made on his life, starring Johnny Depp no less, probably grossed less than his estate manages to generate annually. Uwe Boll, krapmeister Super (yeah that’s not really a word) cranks out one bilious videogame movie every year, beats up pasty European film critics in boxing rings (Youtube Raging Boll) and dares his detractors to put him out of business by soliciting petitions from them, promising to quit if they reach a million: “Nice try, Hündinnen!” Chuck Norris, Van Damme and Steven Segal represent the Holy Trinity of Tripe, with acolytes (including myself) humming their theme tunes in times of danger and unquestioningly accepting their ubermenschian abilities (Chuck Norris facts), seeming resistance to age (rent JVCD. Please.) and musical prowess (Songs from a Crystal Cave). Closer home, Mithun (His Awesomeness), Rajnikanth, Ravi Kissen and Himesh, have all managed to win our hearts, minds and internal organs.

Why, you ask? Ah, here lies the gravamen of my piece.

Coming back to the accusation of having a taste and yet knowing Gunda front-to-back, I was at first unsure of how to respond. I mean, how does one explain the concept of so-bad-its-good and the consequent affection and awe that such a quality can evoke?

Susan Sontag once said that camp cannot be deliberate. She’s right: if Gunda were to be a parody, it would have accessed a talent beyond itself: satire, and become eligible for membership in a posher club as opposed to the seedy back alley tavern it is in right now. It’s why Naked Gun is actually a decent series. Well, in my house anyway. Gunda is quite unembarrassed by itself, revelling in the doggerelled dialogues fit to make your ears shrivel up and disappear into their holes and good-natured about subjecting everyone’s retinas to imagery that makes the sensory neurons detonate. It’s all just so darn sincere that you can’t help but be mesmerised. The hypnotic effect of this film comes from its unapologetic, self-convinced braggadocio, dunked in every kind of political incorrectness and burdened by absolutely no pretensions to being at all ‘good’ or ‘artistically valuable’ in any sense. It sucks, it doesn’t know it; it sucks, you know it. So why can’t we all come together like a happy family and enjoy what we can. You know that friend you’re not sure why you’re friends with...the one who’s always calling you at 3 a.m. from a bender to tell you how much he loves you, owes you your inheritance, cracks inappropriate jokes about your female relatives and yet you get your dander up the moment anyone hints that you ditch them? This is that movie. If you’re in college and don’t have a friend at least resembling this guy, you need to get out more. If you’re in college and haven’t seen Gunda, you need to stay in more. I know it’s a bit of a catch-22 but you’ll figure it out. After all, you were smart enough to get into college in the first place. Bottomline: Gunda has no idea that it’s bad, so why should you? In its honest horrendousness lies its heart.

The second part of its appeal lies in something outside itself. Gunda is an internally sustained system of excreta but when faced with the real world, it’s an interesting foil to the prevailing socioculture. Camp confronts culture as itself, except in its worst, most exaggerated form. The godawfulness of kitsch is only superficially because it looks so bad. I remember reading Milan Kundera in The Unbearable Lightness of Being go on for a good chapter about how real kitsch is bad because it ignores the truth and panders to the middle-class fear of seeing real pain, darkness and suffering. Maybe. I’m not as smart as this dude, so I’m not gonna mount a disagreement in a blog, but I have this feeling that the reason kitsch or camp is really bad is because it unwittingly makes fun of bourgeois aesthetics. The more something is really bad, the more attention and perverse regard it attracts. By juxtaposing itself with what is considered the acme of high culture, it provides a ludicrous, absurd alternative to the gold standard. It is usually at least as solemn in its efforts to exist as the outstandingly good. And often, it curates some of the same themes, albeit turned on their head and dumbed down to the extremes of frivolity. The creators of camp or kitsch are completely ignorant of this of course, otherwise they’d be too clever to make it. Gunda, as anyone who saw movies in the mid-90s knows, represents the worst of life and films back then. We have a country barely heaving itself out of the economic nightmare of pre-NEP era humiliation, successive unstable governments fostering chaos across the nation and the first wave of major reactions to the products of the NEP and its cries of Globalisation-Liberalisation-Privatisation (like cable TV and foreign shoe brands). The movies were confections of blinding/deafening music videos and costumes nobody would be caught dead wearing; the high point was something like Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, a completely unoriginal two-hours worth of film reel devoted to much the same things as Gunda: female lead(s) popping off and being nothing more than the motive for the male lead to do anything; a lot of singing and dancing; a sexually confused ‘comedian’ and a happily ever after. OK, maybe not exactly the same things...but you get my drift. The point is that the most popular film of the same year wasn’t that much different from Gunda when you really sit down to think about it. And that is what anticultural junk is supposed to do – exhibit the stupidest facets of an era alongside the most compelling questions of its time. Unlike great works, it’s always bound by the limitations of time and space, but it does provide an effective counterpoise for the consumers of that time and space and does its job, thanks very much. There’s a pseudo-Hegelian dialectic at work here: culture, anticulture and the emergent ‘cult classic’.

In a departing salvo, here’s a brief review of Gunda that I penned a few months ago:

Obviously, Gunda is a stellar example of mid-90s social realist counter-aesthetic – it tackles heavyweight issues like small town India's growing socio-economic alienation from a newly liberalised metropolitan economy, the emasculation and infantilisation of the Indian male (as evinced by Chutia's condition) in the face of increasing female empowerment and of course, the reason Mithun Da will always be THE MAN. Also see Loha, the prequel to this work of art and indeed, copiously referenced in it, in yet another stunning example of director Kanti Shah's attempts at syncretism - making him a true post-modernist maverick. 10/10

If you take issue with my love for this movie, don’t bother to harangue me with walls. You can see further evidence for the love this film enjoys by reading reviews on IMDb or www.greatbong.net or lurking on any of the many fanclub messageboards. If they don’t convince you, you’re an idiot who doesn’t deserve to breathe the same air as us loyal fans of Mithun Da and his entourage.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, in the inimitable style of Mithun Da (His Awesomeness):

“Main hoon garibon ke liye jyoti aur gundon ke liye jwala”

Move over, Robin Hood.


I'm sure most of you need not be converted and know exactly what I defend. As for the others, beg, steal or borrow your copy of this staple college fare or regret not getting the jokes. It is advisable, nay, imperative that you sit through...I mean...savour this masterpiece nonpareil, for the sake of your own education and for that of those after you. Watch Gunda, so that you can say to your grandkids that you were part of the generation that saw it first.

Why did the Fergussonian cross the road?

Fergusson College should hand its incoming freshmen an insurance policy along with the fee receipt. It's impossible to cross the road to Savera without maiming some precious organ. Given that people spend more time in Savera than in college, this is totally uncool.

Hordes of students find themselves panicking as they begin the journey across the street, flexing their muscles to dodge vehicles of all sizes as they come careening towards them and cowering as rogue scooterists threaten to run them over. It's like the Exodus, only it occurs everyday.

People frantically scuttle around on the zebra crossing like tribal dancers, eager to make the halfway mark. There are unfortunate stragglers who will weigh down the rest of the valiant gang (how about "You go on without me..." eh?). And of course, those who just can't take it any more and flip at inopportune moments - they can be found dazedly cutting a sharp right angle smack in the middle of the road. Entire romances begin and end in the space between two shores of comfort - the hand holding, the synchronised squealing etc. etc. The entire process has the makings of a sterling Steven Segal film: Under Seige 3: Traffic Terrorists. Or something.

We urge the authorities to at least make it worth our while and give it a true Hollywood twist by letting us make out with a hot celebrity waiting at the other end. Sheesh.

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I am no poet...

You may like me,
You may want me.
I may amaze,
Go ahead,go ahead and gaze.

Woo me, praise me,
Write our names together.
Snug,accompanying,
U+Me ,forever.

But I don't belong to you,
Not to you, Not yet.

Prove your loyalty,
Prove you care for me.
Stop and wait to see,
Is that harmony ?

One day, One day,
You will look at me and see,
Your hold is complete.

I will belong to you then,
I will belong to you then, you see ?

---------------- Deborah D'souza

I saw a Goddess

Have you ever met a Goddess? Seen one? Been in the presence of one? Have you ever watched a Goddess dance?
I have.
I saw a Goddess and she was a boy.

Her eyes looked at the world through the kohl lined depths of a little mortal soul. Her red lips parted with the seduction of her serene power as she smiled benevolently at the gathered audience. She had the feet of a little boy and her arms were his wiry limbs. She danced on his feet and she moved with his grace. She was him and he had possessed her. They were one, dancing there as the sun set... They were one, a team, holding us all under their combined spell. We were theirs to enthrall and they were, together, the best at the art of hypnotism.

My eyes remained riveted on this boy. He was dressed in an electric blue sari. Unquestioning of it's relevance to his sexuality; he made the garment his own and sashayed across the stage with an ethereal grace. It was not a sedate grace. It was not the grace of a simple woman. He was the key to the balance. He was the boy and the Goddess, the man-to-be and the young-girl-no-more. The sari was not an extraordinary piece of art. No. In fact it was little more than a routine costume, donned for necessity. He wore a set of ghungru that added more music to his soulful interpretation of the raag. There were the customary flowers in his hair and the traditional red marked his feet and palms. He was dressed to pretend. But he transcended the pretence and made everything real.

The dance was an ancient one. The moves were old and the charm was of a time long gone past. But this little boy, infused it with the vigour of the modern and the restless. His energy was boundless; the Goddess made sure of that; and though he perspired as he virtually led the troupe, he made the evening his own.

The air was charged as he flashed recognition to the rest of the assembled souls. He knew he held us in his thrall. He knew that he was the reason for the admiration. He was aware but conceit was never once apparent. He knew that he was good at what he was doing. He might have been a mortal boy, after all. He might, offstage, suffer from pride. He might be everything that a cynic is comfortable branding a boy not more than 13 years with. He might be everything that i think he is not. Or he might become everything that i hope he will never.

But the fact still stands. He was a Goddess, dancing for mortals.


---- Karishma Modi
http://www.minglebox.com/KarishmaModi

Mr Walt , could you give me a run through on how that love thing works again?

As preteen girls tick at option A B or C to the question "What hobby would your dream guy have ?" with options A.)Basketball (so that you know every girl in the stands is turned on) B.) Writing poetry (So that you can be sure to find a few written about you) C.) Jamming with the band ( Guy-liner turns you on ) or D.)Baking cookies and helping old ladies cross roads (gimme a minute while I fantasize), most likely they can all but picture the guy's face.They probably have a name for him, something that would fit.In certain creepy cases, they've already picked out baby names and crockery patterns.They know what career he will have (something good,to make sure mom n dad are happy),what he looks like (to make you happy),his mannerisms and kinks and slight faults (is eating too fast/slow a fault?).Deluded and with heightened expectations owing to Disney movies and Nicholas Sparks adaptations,growing up none of them are quite sure what to make of the specimen "A" teenage boy . (No no no, somethings wrong, they can't all be mini-skirt following, booger sculpting, WWF watching,saying the absolute wrong thing at the wrong time, sports obsessed, masses of brute can they ? Are these really the boys who'll grow up to be the men of her dreams or is she simply looking in all the wrong places ?)

The results to the quiz which tells them the kind of guy they should be with merely mirrors the kind of guy they want to be with.
Whether she'll admit it to you or not, every girl has a type.It may seem like a silly concept thrown around for fun when she's sizing up someone but unconsciously or not,she's excited to meet someone who seems like "her type" (she likes to believe no one else is looking for the same thing). If she doesn't seem to have met anyone ,her imaginary ideal will suffice until she meets or spots the Real McCoy.
But maybe, just maybe, its time she realized that this idea of what perfection (or close to it) should be ,isn't what will make her the most happy.Maybe once in awhile there should be allowances made for those that don't fit that cookie cutter mould she's made up to sort through boys, cause sometimes when all reason, circumspection and theoretical idealism fails, perhaps its time for her to accept that our souls seek out those who maybe able to enrich our lives and minds in ways we didn't think possible.So its time she abandoned the ideal,its time she stop dismissing a liking towards boys that wouldn't have been dreamt of when she was twelve.Maybe someone who she least expects to, will be the only one able to make her happy, just as she deserves to be.

Note:apologies for the sap. Will be back to snark asap. Until then , sing westlife songs, stop killing insects to watch them squirm and watch Dawson's Creek.Cheerio.

-------------Deborah D'souza

Marath-awe!

There's a certain charm about that part of town that makes it so much easier to appreciate the ethnic identity of Pune as the cultural heart of Maharashtra. The many labyrinthine roads that bear the names of some of the most Marathi of Marathi names....

The eateries may boast of multi-cuisine. The ice-cream parlours scream out names of chocolate so distinctly French and Belgian, etc., etc.. There are book stores and there are juice bars. But there is this one stamp that you simply cannot deny. It is the stamp of Poona. The stamp of the cultured Marathi-Brahmin ethnicity. The bungalows and the skin, the eyes and the accent. The major hitch in these areas is that outsiders are obvious and that if you're not a Marathi- manoos , you are on the fringes of this world of old richesse. This is how the cookie was baked. These fair-skinned, light-eyed serenely dignified make the world of the un-blessed-s seem like an unfortunate, terrible, little something that, oh, we'll never have to endure.

To me, a half breed (in a sense), the Marathis of Poona, the assal Marathis make a statement far more profound than anything that anyone else could say in this ancient city of old habits. We have throngs of non-Marathi folks. Everyone is accepted and everyone is made to feel at home. There is nothing wrong with the notion of being a non-Marathi/non-Marathi-Brahmin here, in Pune. But then there is that sense of feeling the awe that i feel when you're a veritable alien among among these unassumingly-yet-proudly Marathi-Marathis.

I know a lot of them personally and i am fascinated by their accent and their seemingly inherited intellectuality, their uber-calm and composed air of being the alphas, the obviously un-obesqious ones that have to make no justifications for their lives, their interests or their mentality.

There is nothing negative about my reverence for them. There is simple awe. Awe exemplified by the fact that their theatre, their poetry, their language, their finesse always reminds me of royals. They are the uncrowned aristocracy of this little city of lasting stereotypes. They are the people that make it possible to hear some of the most endearingly Marathi-inflected-English-conversation ever. They are the blend between the new Poona of the youth and the old Poona of their grand-parents and their great-great-great-grandparents. They are the link between the vanishing mindset of "having it and knowing it" and "wanting it, coveting it, getting it". Mostly it is their charm and their command over the city as a whole.

Or else it is just me: wanting to worship something real.


----Karishma Modi
http://www.minglebox.com/KarishmaModi