Love in the times of the Jaipur Literature Festival!

A man needs to have a certain focus in his life, a direction, a map of the things that he must do in the future. It is the mantra of good living. And that is why in that extremely philosophical and profound list of “things I must do in 2012”, ‘eating Kakori kabab in Chandni Chowk’ and ‘kissing a Spanish girl’ found top ranks, right below ‘lazing and doing nothing’.

Somewhere in the list, I also scribbled ‘attending the Jaipur Literature Festival’.

And because I am a man of my word, on a cold, wintery January Friday night, I found myself standing at Old Delhi railway station shivering and cursing myself as to why that list ever found existence.

It all started making perfect sense the moment I reached Jaipur. For a sizable station, Jaipur was startlingly clean. As my companion confirmed, the city was also less lecherous than India’s capital. As the roads were less populated, even the air seemed fresher. Life outside a metro has its own slow pace, it is like a dog – not a frisky puppy that has to run about chasing every smell, or squirting every bush. But an ancient, venerable thirteen year old Saint Bernard that refuses to budge and yet looks stately and majestic, even when you are lying at full stretch and pushing its bottoms with all your might.

At around noon, my platoon and I marched into the venue of the festival – Diggi Palace. And with the same enthusiasm as the one that got me in, I strode back out because I did not have an entry pass. Not that I am a stickler for rules and I would rather die than turn my back on a task, but then fleeing does seem like a reasonable option when a battalion of cops charge at you with their canes.

It is said that the Saturday of 21st saw the highest ever recorded turnout at the festival – credible sources confirm that there were over 17,000 people that Diggi was holding, and bursting with. In a couple of hours though, the security let us make fresh registrations and soon we were inside the imperial blue gates!

The venue looked every bit as colourful as the website. Pink, yellow and blue streamers hung near the entrance. The lawns were festive – discussion tents, book stalls, snack shops found their own spaces, and around them we were all littered. My feelings remained mixed, though. While a part of me rejoiced at this festive spirit, the other half balked at a large section of the population – in their Ray Bans and Guccis and Zaras and Louis Vittons, their smart phones never leaving their hands. I had seen them before – in the World Cup finals with their ‘guest passes’ and surely they were also there at Noida’s grand F1 event.

The sessions found full houses. There were discussions on tigers, the publishing industry, regional literature, music etc. In between, we flitted around the stalls, weaving our way through thousands of others weaving their way through us. And then she came.

You know that thing about time standing still? And the world being a blur? As she came towards me, one pretty step at a time, as she moved past me, one delectable step at a time, the skies changed their complexion from an evil grey to a romantic bright sky blue. The sun, it came out from behind the clouds, as golden and radiant as golden and radiant can be. And my heart, it sang just like Shahrukh Khan’s did when he first spotted Shanti (Deepika Padukone) in Om Shanti Om.

“That’s Fatima Bhutto” someone screamed from the back. And I wanted to smack them, could they not see that the hero was trying to sing a song and woo his girl! I turned back to look at the lissome thing, and she looked as if she was in search of her hero too. Actually, she was deep in discussion with the Rajasthan royalty, but let lovers believe in what they must.

As the saying goes, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Quick, a plan must be formulated. But right then she turned and passed me again and that familiar Om Shanti Om song started welling up in my bosom – “Kitna kuchh kehna hai fir bhi hai dil mein sawaal kayi…” Faint in the background, I could see the familiar small figure of the renowned music and film director Vishal Bhardwaj as he signed some fans’ autographs and I wished he had a casio instead of a pen in his hand so that he could supplement my baritone with some lilting music. Frantically, I looked around for loose threads about her that my cuff links would get stuck to, the way Shahrukh’s had in Deepika’s but sadly neither were her clothes tattered nor did my jacket have any signs of cuffs. The divine thing left, unaware of the greatest love story that could have ever been.

The rest of the day passed by as days do. From time to time, I would break into a line from the song, startling audiences that were maintaining pin drop silences in the face of profound discussions amid eminent personalities. At other times, I would stare at the sky piercingly as if to obtain unobtainable answers from it but it ignored the stare as an elephant would a shriveled grape.

Deluded one-sided romances apart, the festival was beautiful in the entirety of the two days that I was there. Unlike the huge controversy and clamour about Rushdie, the government and the Indian state that the media and twitter so happily and enthusiastically built in the country, back then in Jaipur that weekend there was hardly anyone upset or perturbed or giving the issue so much importance. We all enjoyed what the organizers had given us – a festival, a tremendous package of some of the best authors in the world, and books.

If only the media (social? Not really) could pay attention to some of the finer things the festival stood for… Jaipur, next year I’ll be back again, boarding a train on a cold wintery Delhi night, hopefully not cursing this time.

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Nero takes on bollywood!

The Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad is famous for two things. Roxy, the royal german shepherd and Mr A F Mathew (Author pauses, for everyone to say, “Nero, we are sure you are as famous as they are”). Mathew is a professor of ‘World Culture and Communications’ and is one of the funniest, most sarcastic, and most knowledgable professors India has perhaps known. Of course he’s a mallu.

At the end of his course last term , he asked us to submit an assigment on his subject ‘Media stereotypes’. We were allowed to choose, for ourselves, the stereotype topic and below, is my assignment, word by word.

The ‘Sensitive’ portrayal of love and rape scenes in bollywood:
Disclaimer: The following presentation is a sarcastic dig at the Indian media (Bollywood, to be more specific) for its stereotypical treatment of portraying love, lust and basically just about everything. The images attached might just want to make the audience give up on watching hindi commercial cinema forever.

Causes that make the innocent, puppy love between hero and heroine change into them wanting to mate at that very instant:

1) The hero and heroine are laughing and playfully chasing one another all over a room, and then ‘accidentally’ fall on the bed. Their faces touch as they get up and they realize a never before love/lust for each other. Hero kisses heroine’s neck, heroine goes mad with frenzy.

2) There’s a wild, wild, wild thunderstorm and ‘frightening’ lightning. Heroine is scared out of her wits and runs towards the hero and hugs him. During this tender embrace, they realize the need to rub each other’s back with a vigour that can, in polite terms can only be described, as extremely aggressive.

The portrayal of love scenes:
1) It’s always a hug. According to Bollywood, all good Indian men and women make love to each other by hugging. Gentle affection is depicted by filming the female protagonist resting her head on her lover’s shoulder whereas scenes which have to convey a deeper physical bonding are shown by aggressive rubbing of counterpart’s backs by the couple and disgusting facial expressions (to show they are losing control) in synchronization. But either way, it has to be shown thru a hug. How, for crying out aloud, can we produce babies by hugging, I wonder.

The copulation scene (or, what actually immediately follows the hugging scene):

Pollinating flowers :
For some funny reason, flowers decide to show affection to one another , i.e they start pollinating, when lovers hug . Soft lilting music in the background, and roses vibrating on their axes is the most common Bollywood portrayal for indicating that ‘love is in the air’. The two lovers would have just started hugging and getting intimate, and suddenly the scene would change over to two flowers swaying left, right, helter skelter, nodding their little heads as if to mark approval of this ‘sacrosanct’ act. Sometimes, when flowers are not available, a vigorously shaking bush would suit just as fine to portray physical affection between the protagonists.

Roaring fire or stereotype number ‘do’:
The hero and heroine were travelling in a car which has now broken down in the middle of nowhere. It’s raining cats, dogs and hippopotamuses. They spot a dark bungalow and decide to take refuge for the night. Once inside, the heroine (as usual) is feeling scared and cold, so macho man lights up a fire in the fireplace provided (how convenient!). Love sprouts all of a sudden and the protagonists move to hug each other. As soon as they start hugging, the camera moves to the roaring fire blazing ‘happily’.

Fact : Intensity of roaring fire is directly proportional to lust between the protagonists.

Baby’s photo: Bollywood cinema at its ‘bollywoodish’ best.
The hero is in a playful mood. He teases the heroine and ‘mischievously’ kisses her. The heroine (as usual) is scared out of her wits, this time because, “Rahul, what are you doing? Everyone’s here. Someone might see us”. But then, swayed by emotions, she lets the buffoon hug her. Camera shot moves from the protagonists to a wall, where a baby’s photo is staring back at the audience. The baby usually has a finger on his mouth, asking the audience to keep shhh about the deed.
Author’s observation: I have a strong suspicion that it’s the same baby that’s being used for all these films right from the 1920’s. The fellow must be at least eighty by now, and quite frankly speaking, pretty irritated for having to shhh the audience for ‘centuries.

Boiling milk: Note, this is the author’s personal favourite.

Scene: The hero is (as usual) in a playful mood. He comes up from the behind the heroine, who is industriously working in the kitchen. Hero grabs heroine around the waist, and the entire setting – the heroine, her waist, the colour of the wall, the cauliflower in the basket, the dirty utensils in the sink – all drive the hero’s sexual urges, and they start kissing. For some reason, the camera is now more focused on telling us the status of the boiling milk on the stove rather than the love making scene.

The poor milk steadily reaches its maximum boiling point and starts spilling over the utensil, which, please note, is the ONE AND ONLY WAY that signifies that yes, the hero and heroine have gone beyond kissing to the next stage of physical love.

The bedside lamp and the fan:
The hero and heroine are in their bedroom. They feel the urge to touch each other and lie down on the bed. For some reason, they never lie with their heads on the same side as the night lamp placed next to the bed. All the male lead stars in Bollywood must have been skilled footballers in their heyday, as none of them, not even one, ever use their hands to switch off the night lamp. What? Of course the two can touch each other only when the lights are off!!!! Hero skillfully, without once removing his gaze from the heroine’s face, uses his toe to switch off the lamp, and buries his stupid head in her neck. The camera moves to the ceiling fan in the room, which wants to make out too, so it shows off in front of the tube light by rotating at top speed.

The depiction of Rape (raping the audience’s mind?) scenes:

The act though thoroughly heinous in nature, is mostly shown in strange and often bemusing ways. The ‘bad’ guy is always fixated with the sleeves of the heroine’s dress. The author would like to keep his hand on the Gita (the book, you perverts!) and swear that bollywood villains get turned on only when they tear off the victim’s sleeves. Also, till this stage, the heroine is not too scared. I mean, she is not exactly humming happy tunes to herself but she’s still composed. But as soon as the bad guy reaches upto her and rips those sleeves, she finally concludes that uh oh, this must mean he’s gonna rape me, and starts crying hysterically. With all her might. (Or maybe the dress was expensive and she is terribly angry that he tore it!!)

An essential ‘prop’ for a rape scene is heavy lightning. The scene alternates between the villain savagely ttacking the heroine’s neck and lightning in the heavenly skies. For some reason, it never rains.

There are probably hundreds of other ways in which our filmy couples mate, and our friendly neighbourhood villain’s rape, but this post is already getting too long, so adios people and have an awesome day.

p.s 1) Mathew Sir is yet to check my assignment. Think he’ll gimme a good grade?
p.s 2) Someone shoot the guy who is charge of the “lightning” prop. Those “lightnings” are as artificial as artificial could be.