Skip to main content

Life after the fifteen minutes

I was walking at Carter Road last evening. Yes, I occasionally do exercise more than my digestive system.

I came across a candle march/ forum with Milind Soman standing there. Every girl I knew in college had a crush on him As do most women I know now. Turned out that the gathering was organised by NDTV. A Celebrate Bandra rock show was going on five feet away. It was close to nine o clock and they stopped the band for a few minutes to observe silence. The band joined Soman for a TV grab. A few teens clicking it all on their mobile were asked to join in by the anchor.

I resisted the urge to jump in, come on TV and wave at my mom. I marched on, instead, in my war against cholesterol. Without a candle.

I have got nothing against candle marches. As Rahul Bose said on CNN IBN yesterday everyone has their own way of coping.

Nor am I belittling the attacks because they happened in the 'First World' of South Mumbai.

The point that I am trying to make is that there is a lot that needs to be done. Jawans guarding the Gateway sleeping on the pavements? NSG Mumbai base formed at Pune because of land problems here? Force One Guards borrowing AK 47s from the CRPF to practice as guns haven't been procured for them?

No Prime Minister, not happening.

Comments

Scarlett said…
I've met Milind Soman. Went to take his interview once. He was in his "I love facial hair" phase but he look smouldering inspite of all that facial hair! Can't imagine how hot he would look without!
Kalyan Karmakar said…
he has a very thick stubble now Scarlett. "designer stubble' as they used to call it during the George Michael days.

last time I bumped into him was at the ATM at Waterfield Road where he had very long hair. K was in the auto luckily for me. And in a cab on the way back from work yesterday :)
Magical Homes said…
i saw a candle march at andheri while i was going from office to hangla's to get some biryani packed. i agree with you. i don't really believe in them. and nothing really has changed. worse still were the tv channels producing a whole lot of venom spewing programs to grab trps again. caught suhel seth and shobha de on times now yet again....
Kalyan Karmakar said…
M D, and there is this couple Manish Tiwari and Ravi Shankar Jha who keep crossing channels and squabbling with each other... get a room guys
Kalyan Karmakar said…
M D is the biriyani as good as their rolls or as bad as their kosha mangsho?
Rahul Ghosh said…
There is a Rahul Ghosh who gives soundbytes to CNN-IBN???
Kalyan Karmakar said…
Rahul, I caught the typo a day or so back. Didn't get around to fixing it.

Would attribute it to much highher share of mind of Ghosh Babu

Popular posts from this blog

Queue-spreading because its spelling is the least of our problem with queues

Scene 1: I had gone to pay local taxes at a government office in Bandra a few days back. I was directed to a table where there was no-one else waiting. I went up to the officer at the desk and submitted our papers. He keyed in the details in to his computer. The results flashed immediately. I gave our cheque, so far so good. Then the officer pointed out that the cheque was Rs 12 (twelve) more than what was due. We looked at each other and tried to figure out what has to be done. Suddenly an elderly corpulent gentleman came and sidled up and stood beside me. I waited a for a couple of seconds. I thought he might have a question for the officer. I looked at the encroacher. He smiled at me. There was no-one behind me and yet he stood beside me. I looked at him and said, 'do you mind standing behind me? We are discussing something here.' He smiled at me and said, 'no problem, I will wait.' I drew my breath and said, 'can you please stand in the queue while we...

The importance of being 'Nyaka'

'Nyaka' is a Bengali term which beats translation. It could mean coy, coquettish, scheming, la di da. There is no one word which captures it. The term is used in a pejorative context and has a sarcastic tone to it. Used a bit more for women than for men. Has a feminine context when used for men. I posed the challenge of translating 'nyaka' into English to fellow Bengalis in Facebook. Here's a sample of the answers that I got. I have removed the names and kept the statuese as is, hope it's not too difficult to read Bong man 1 Coy.....but that does capture the essence 14 December at 14:37 · Me No ...not entirely. A colleague just suggested precocious. Maybe its too intrinsic a Bong trait to be translated :) 14 December at 14:50 · Bong woman 1 kol-lan, difficult to get a english / hindi word for nyaka. 14 December at 15:11 · me that's the point 14 December at 15:15 · Bong woman 2 oh, i think the essence of the word 'nyaka' will be lost in translation. ...

The impotence of middle class morality

We studied George Bernard Shaw's 'Pygmalion' in school. I remember a character, Mr Dolittle (not sure of the spelling), who made a compelling argument against what he called middle class morality . The crux was that the rich can do whatever they want, the poor are desperate and therefore have no standards to match up to. It is the middle class who get screwed (I am paraphrasing heavily here) because they have to live up to certain norms of morality without the means to do so. Closer home was this serial called ' Wagle ki duniya ' which used to come on telly in the eighties . This was about a middle aged, middle class man, Mr Wagle , and his struggle for existence. There was an episode where he had to give a bribe to a government official. Nothing new about that. But the twist was that straight laced Mr Wagle had no idea about how to give a bribe! I remember our then school principal, Mrs Kapper , gave that as an example of how all of us should be good, honest,...