Category Archives: Humour

July 16, 2010 · 11:39 am

How to… be a mega serial addict

    Photo: The Hindu

  1. Make no mistake – being addicted to a mega serial is hard work. You’re in it for the long haul. We’re not talking a couple of weeks or even months. These serials run for at least a couple of years at a stretch and you need to be mentally prepared to go the distance with its long-suffering heroine.
  2. Remember, these serials have been built as an extreme test of patience, so you have to persevere. Every emotionally wrought situation – the heroine’s long-lost sister has suddenly reappeared but has amnesia! Her husband has been shot in the head and his life hangs by a thread! – will be as drawn out for as long as it possibly can, and you will have to withstand many, many weekend cliff-hangers. (You might want to practice deep breathing for those moments when the urge to wring the director’s neck is particularly strong.)
  3. Anyone who believes that watching a tele-serial doesn’t exercise the ol’ brain cells has obviously never followed one before. It isn’t just those complicated plot twists (see above) that keep you on your toes mentally; it’s also those entire generation shifts that happen every now and again (a whole new cast to keep track of!) and all those convoluted relationships that need to be followed (the first husband’s third wife’s illegitimate daughter’s best friend’s half brother, etc.) A serial family tree tacked to the living room wall is strongly recommended.
  4. Being a serial addict also requires considerable emotional investment. Following those catastrophic events that happen to your favourite characters every week – murder, betrayal, family feuds and the odd heart attack or two – can be quite exhausting. But a true addict doesn’t fight it; give in to the blatantly manipulative storylines, revel in the melodramatic music, fret and fume vocally at injustices meted out to the heroine and shed a sentimental tear at her ultimate triumph over evil (and philandering husbands).
  5. Finally, following a mega serial day after day, week after week requires planning. You will have a wedding reception/family dinner/office function to attend precisely on the day a crucial revelation about the heroine’s parentage is to be made. Inconsiderate friends/family members will interrupt when the drama’s at its peak. Your motto must be ‘be prepared’: recorders on standby at all times, re-air times on your fingertips, and the world at large prepped that only the most dire emergencies need apply for your attention during that period.

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July 14, 2010 · 7:29 pm

Stand up and be counted: The Great Indian Census of 2010

Photo: S.S. Kumar

I’ve finally done it; I am now officially part of the mammoth national undertaking that is the Indian Census of 2010. I’ve been counted. And all it took was a month of missed visits and phone calls to and from my friendly neighbourhood census officer, frayed nerves and mounting stress on both sides and a grand finale worthy of a Hollywood summer blockbuster to get it done by deadline (July 15).

Here’s the thing. Everyone from our Prime Minister down has been sitting around debating what should be covered as part of the census — let’s call it the Caste Counting conundrum — and the deep philosophical implications thereof (“If caste is not covered in the census, does it mean it will no longer exist?”). But no one is talking about how ridiculous the task is logistically; I mean, how the heck does one go about counting one billion plus people?

Well, I got a bit of a glimpse into the process and let me tell you, it ain’t pretty. This is an undertaking of the Indian government, so naturally there is absolutely no system of any sort in place. The grand plan? Get together a bunch of hapless men and women, give them each a big, black carrybag with the big, broad census sheets attached to big, broad boards  and then send them forth on foot on our crazy streets… at the same time everyday. (Just to make things more fun, they decide to get started at the height of our hideously hot and humid Chennai summer. )

Now what this means is that Mrs. A, my census lady, came to my apartment at the same time every afternoon for nearly a week and I was blissfully unaware of it. A parcel delivery guy comes once and if you’re not home, he leaves you a note, a number and an address you can contact him at. But I only come to know that my country’s trying to take my attendance when the sweet 70-something year old mami next door finally catches hold of me as I come home late one evening and anxiously passes on the message that Mrs. A’s been to my flat four times and wants me to call her on her cell. She gives me the number written in her neat, slightly shaky handwriting on a torn-off piece of paper, which, of course, I promptly lose.

About a week later, I meet Census Lady in person when she rings the doorbell just as I’m dashing out in the afternoon for a work assignment (I’d just happened to stop by to pick something up on the way). I am, as always, cutting it perilously fine. As in, I literally have every second of the next thirty minutes accounted for, and there’s no leeway for census officers who pop up out of nowhere. Unsurprisingly, our first meeting is not a success. She blocks my path and threatens to null and void my existence on the national census if I don’t give her the info she needs; I lose my cool and tell her I’ll lose my job if she doesn’t move out of my way right now. She points out she has a job to do too, and I calm down a bit and promise I will give her the details, will come to her office if need be,  and give her my cell number as a peace offering. She drops the attitude and apologises for getting snippy; it’s just that she’d already come by five or six times on foot, and not found us there: “Please don’t take it the wrong way, meddam.”  I tell her it’s just me and the husband here and we both work, so there’ll never be anyone home at this time, can’t she come in the morning? (This breathlessly as I run down the stairs – no electricity). She just looks at me stoically as we pause near my car, and says what is to become a familiar litany in the weeks that follow: “I am in office till 2 p.m., after that I’m coming for taking census.” I give up and jump into the vehicle; if I don’t hurry, I won’t have a job to be at the following afternoon.

That heralds the beginning of a strange new phone friendship between me and Mrs. A. She calls every now and again in the afternoon to say she’s at my door. Her faith is touching, really; clearly she believes if she rings a bell often enough, the door will magically open one of these afternoons. Either that or she’s not particularly impressed with my professionalism and doeesn’t think I’ll be holding on to this job for long. Each time I re-iterate with growing desperation and guilt that no, no, I’m not home, I’ll come to your office one of these days, I promise. But that day never seems to come; something seems to crop up every morning and I can’t make it. It reaches a point when I’m haunted by Mrs. A’s sad face in my dreams at night. “I’m coming to your house on foot, meddam… 10 times I’ve come.”

I do manage to make the time to go in search of her office one morning, only to end up getting lost. Forget finding Venkataratnam Nagar Ext, Ist street; no one seems to have even heard of the darn place. After driving around in circles for half an hour, I call her, only to hear her sniffly voice on the other end tell me that she’s sick and on leave that day. Sometimes you just have to admit defeat; I turn around meekly and head to work.

As per government regulation, she normally doesn’t work Saturdays, but that weekend, presumably because she’s now feeling a similar sense of desperation, she turns up at my flat. Needless to say, both the husband and I are working that particular Saturday and no one’s home. By now,  I’m starting to feel quite miserable every time ‘Census Lady’ flashes on my cellphone.

Determined to put an end to this continuing torture, I finally track down the phantom government office on the phantom street (turns out it’s nestled somewhere in the heart of Kasturba Nagar… who knew?) on the morning of July 14 (one day to deadline. It’s now or never.) In a quiet, shady cul-de-sac in the middle of the residential neighbourhood stands the nondescript building with an Ambassador out front bearing a ‘Govt of India’ license plate (some things never change, I think fondly). I’m feeling rather cheerful as I bound up the stairs; it’s almost over now. I enter expecting a scene of utter chaos… they are, after all, counting a million or so households, but all I find are four elderly men and women silently sitting behind their computer screens, and nothing much else. One of them, Kindly Old Man No. 1, tells me, to my disbelief, that Mrs. A is ‘on leave’ and my bubbly mood fizzles out completely. A sense of being in some sort of neverending nightmare comes over me; was I not meant to be part of the 2010 census? Was it all some sort of elaborate joke? Kindly Old Man No. 2 seems to sense my desperation and asks me which street I live on, clearly wanting to help. But he sadly shakes his head when I tell him. “I’m doing only fusst main road, ma.” A couple of calls later, and we uncover the final cruel twist to the story; today was the one day Mrs. A decided to break the rules and go to take census before coming to office.

Close to tears now, I call Mrs. A, and tell her in a wavering voice that I’m in her office while she, apparently, is one street away from my home. Desparate times call for desparate measures, and Mrs. A takes the situation firmly in hand. “Come to the corner of the main road by the hospital. I will wait there… maroon sari,” she tells me somewhat cryptically. Grasping at straws now, I follow the instructions obediently and make my way there in record time. I park and look around furtively, feeling for all the world like I’m trapped in some B-grade Tamil spy movie… but no maroon sari. And then, suddenly, the trees across the street seem to part and the sari appears in my field of vision, as autos and cyclists whiz by. I feel like dramatic music ought to be swelling in the background. I lean forward to open the car door and signal to her, but Mrs. A seems to recall my car and comes straight towards me with a smile. I’ve never been this happy to see  a maroon nylon sari, sensibly oiled plait and big, black census bag before in my life; we’re virtually like long-lost friends being reunited after decades apart. “Sorry meddam, I’ve really taken up your time and troubled you,” she says as she gets into the car. “No, no, I’m sorry,” I say, beaming like an idiot.

The actual census-taking process is over ridiculously fast — we cover the number of rooms in my house, whether we have a radio or internet connection, our birthdays  etc. at record speed. She apologises again, saying she’d have just gotten the details over the phone except that I have to sign the form. You don’t have to apologise, I tell her.

She says with a sigh as she puts the forms away, “If everyone who missed the census visit took the trouble to come and give me the information like you, my job would be a lot easier.”

And just like that it’s all worth it. As I watch, she hefts the bag on her shoulder and walks over to some hawkers nearby, obviously asking for directions, the noon-day sun beating down on her maroon sari and her sensible plait. The sheer enormity of the task she and all those men and women in the office I’d visited had dawns on me. It’s a thankless job, and I’m just glad that I did my bit to help out.

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July 4, 2010 · 6:42 pm

Highway to Heaven: The Gang of Biker Vadhyars

It’s a sleepy Sunday afternoon in Chennai and we’re in our car, making our way back home after lunch through the sparse traffic. I’m twiddling with the radio dial, he’s making desultory conversation, and both of us are already halfway into our Sunday afternoon nap mode when we suddenly hear a throaty vroom vroom from somewhere behind us. Not good. It’s a sound familiar to any Chennai-ite and usually signals the arrival of one of those greasy-haired, too-tight-jeans-wearing bikers who gets his kicks by flouting road rules to such an extent that auto drivers seem positively staid by comparison. And if there’s one, there’ll be more; they invariably travel in packs.

“Uh-oh,” I begin, “it’s one of those crazy biker gan–”

Before the words have left my mouth, he’s streaked past us in a blur, a flash of pristine white. It takes my somnolent brain a minute to process that there’s something rather different about this biker. It isn’t his attitude; no, he’s loudly signalling his fellow bikers across the three lanes, zipping in and out between vehicles, and being quite as obnoxious as the worst of them. But this one’s hair is pulled back in a tightly-coiled kudmi, not a tendril out of place (I spend a moment admiring the sheer staying power of that knot). And no jeans, tight or otherwise or t-shirt with lewd slogan in sight. No, this guy flies by with his panchakacham flapping briskly in the wind, his poonal streaming devil-may-care somewhere past his left ear and his angavastram bellowing behind him like some sort of weird Tam-Bram version of Batman’s cape.

“Do you see what I see?” I ask the husband falteringly.

Before he can answer, the scene takes on an even more surreal feel. Vadhyar Biker No. 1 has now been joined by two others in equally complete priestly garb (though their kudmi-tying skills aren’t quite on par — definitely some frizz happening with one) and they all three zoom into our field of vision, gesturing, hooting, and generally behaving as if Lalitha Sahasranamam is the last thing on their minds . Dear God, I think. It’s a whole gang of them.

“If you mean the Hell’s Angels of Mylapore, then yes,” he says, sounding as shaken as I feel.

By this point, the Gang of Biker Vadhyars, led by he of the perfect kudmi, have congregated at one point for a U-turn, and when we last see them, are high-fiving each other and laughing fit to fall off their bikes. No religious ceremony will never be the same to me again, I think dazedly, as we continue our journey in stunned silence. The next time I see three vadhyars sitting together at some solemn occasion like a shraddham, I’m not going to be able to get the image of them doing wheelies out of my head. 

Okay, so our society is changing fast. In the US, I once saw a vadhyar arrive at my aunt’s house in jeans and a t-shirt, change into veshti etc. to conduct the poojai in her fireplace and then zoom off again in his Toyota Camry. We got to change with the times, I get it. Take the vadhyar at my friend’s recent engagement, who stayed plugged in to his MP3 player (ear phones dangling stylishly off one ear) the whole time. That I can understand — he’s only human, he needs to listen to music during work, yada yada. We all do it.

But this? Even typing ‘Hell’s Angels’ in the same sentence as ‘vadhyar’ feels faintly blasphemous. And yet, those three were the veritable embodiment of biker ‘tude.  Then a small voice in my head says, why not? Just because a guy’s day job involves piety and prayer doesn’t mean he can’t be a bad-ass biker by night (or in this case, by afternoon). We all need a way to unwind. Yoga or meditation seem a little more apt, perhaps, but hey, who am I to judge? Maybe guys with a direct line to God are the only ones who should to be zipping around at those speeds on our roads anyway.

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June 19, 2010 · 1:49 pm

How to… be germphobic

1. Repeat after me: Hand-sanitiser is your new best friend. You need to keep one little bottle in your bag, one on your desk and, naturally, one in every room of the house, so that it’s always readily at hand to annihilate any errant germs that might venture on to your palm.

 2. Any and every new surface of contact must be viewed with suspicion pending further careful examination. A pocket-size packet of tissues (or better still, wet wipes — with disinfectant, of course) in the bag is indispensable for dusting/wiping those grimy cinema theatre seats (shudder) or messy tables at the neighbourhood restaurant (double shudder).

 3. It doesn’t matter if you’re truly, madly, deeply in love with them or if they’re your Best Friend Forever. If they have a sniffley, sneezy cold or a horrible, hacking cough, they need to keep away. A true germphobic makes no distinctions — friend or foe, a germ-carrier is persona non grata. (You might want to form relationships with the less-sensitive sort).

 4. The fine art of germphobia also requires considerable research. Every new bug making its rounds in the city must be thoroughly researched online, and every single possible symptom anxiously tallied against those of any family members/colleagues who are currently under the weather (if they match even slightly, see No. 3). Then, all possible cures must be listed, and your neighbourhood pharmacist (you’re on first name terms with him, of course) consulted on availability. It’s a tough life.

 5. Finally, the hardcore germphobic is not shy about spreading the message. If you regularly scold your significant other for not using a tissue when he/she sneezes or instruct your co-workers, schoolmarm style, to use hand-sanitiser before lunch, you’re already halfway there.

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May 9, 2010 · 6:26 pm

Kadais (Part II): Thalapakattu Biriyani and Men’s Beauty Parlours

See, I’d planned to do a second piece on theyil kadais in the city (a sorta sequel to this one) but then I came across some irresistible signboards on a couple of other kadais meanwhile, and the series took a bit of a detour. Here goes 🙂

‘Executive Package’. Written in neat white font on a dark blue signboard put up high on a drab, office-type building in Adyar (I don’t what it is about Adyar and awesome signage… first the iconic ‘Hotel Runs’, apparently now an unofficial tourist destination, the safari kadai and now this), the sign reeks of officialdom. Taking in the name and the style of presentation, one immediately assumes, naturally, that this is a corporate courier company of some sort. Like, you know, ‘we deliver your top secretest documents anywhere anytime’ and all that. But one would be dead wrong. Because right below, in the same super serious and businesslike font, are the words ‘Exclusive Men’s Beauty Parlour’.

The ingenuity is remarkable. Think about it. This humble sign is attempting to do the impossible — appeal to both your average stick-in-the-mud executive and your with-it metrosexual at the same time. The businesslike title and signage should reassure the middle-aged executive who wouldn’t, for instance, be caught dead going into one of those super stylish, house-music-pumping, unisex salons frequented by ‘The Youth’ (with the images of scarily hip-looking men and women with spiky purple hair out front). At the same time, the discrete ‘Men’s Beauty Parlour’ at the bottom should effectively draw in the blossoming middle-class metrosexual who believes unabashedly in the notion of male beauty and therefore in visiting its Mecca, the male beauty parlour, facials, foot scrubs and all.

This is a place, one feels, where sufficiently serious-minded young men in neat tailored trousers and full-sleeved white shirts (with starched collars, of course) will give you fabulous manicures with business-like efficiency, where a tea boy will serve you hot tea/kaapi with Marie biscuits as you wait and you have plenty of peons to sweep up or wash your hair rapidly before styling. It’s truly a breakthrough in marketing the concept of the ‘male beauty parlour’ to the fuddy-duddy crowd.

Ingenious kadai no. 2 is a biriyani place I passed by on ECR the other day. At first glance, its sign looked much the same as that of any other Thalapakattu Biriyani joint in the city, except that it seemed a little more crowded (hardly enough space for the customary headgear (thalapakattu) drawing). That’s when I realised this is a two-for-one sign, with the bottom half — in bold orange– proclaiming proudly that this is also ‘Gayathri Travels’.

Of course, I immediately began to imagine a neatly dressed travel agent in glasses sitting behind a computer, politely making bookings for a three-day package to Singapore (“There is one beginning on June 16… shall I pencil you in? I can get you an excellent deal”), flanked on either side by huge, steaming biryani pots being stirred by big, sweaty men in lungis and baniyans (handle bar mustaches are optional). This is one travel agent’s office where delays are no issue; you can just shovel in freshly made biriyani as you wait.

This delicious picture was mildly ruined by my husband informing me that this isn’t that sort of travels place, but merely a sort of glorified bus depot with benefits. As in, you can purchase tickets for various tour bus companies here, and their buses stop here, so you can hop on. Apparently, it’s pretty common too.

But I’m struck, once again, by the terrific multi-tasking abilities of our kutti roadside kadais. Hungry travellers hopping off after a tiring ride can tuck into the hot-n-spicy confections and families with a 13-hour ride ahead can pack some up for the road. And of course, the biriyani will keep you going during the inevitable delays…

I mean, does any tour bus stop in London or New York provide you that sort of service? No, you have to trudge to the nearest Starbucks and get fleeced for a cup of coffee and a sandwich.  Just like no Parisian beautician ever thought of ‘Executive Package’ to draw in their shyer male clientèle.

Viva la Chennai, I say!

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May 6, 2010 · 10:51 am

How to… be a chocoholic

1. Some people think chocoholism is about an ongoing love affair with the Lindts or Godivas of the choco universe. Well, there is that. But there’s also no elitism in true chocoholism. In other words, you take chocolate in any form, anytime. Even if it’s that squished, mostly-melted last piece of choco toffee you discovered at the bottom of your handbag.

2. For the hardcore chocoholic, there is no such thing as too much chocolate or a choco overdose. So, if you’re at a restaurant and the waiter explains that ‘Chocolate Explosion’ on the dessert menu is a chocolate cake with chocolate icing, with chocolate sauce on top and chocolate ice-cream on the side, your only reaction should be, ‘Mmmm. Chocolate’.

3. By the same measure, there’s no such thing as too little chocolate for you to care about. Meaning, at the end of any choco binge, every last bit of chocolate must be scraped/licked off the wrapping/cup/packaging, dignity be damned.

4. The worth of a proposed holiday plan must be measured by the likelihood of passing through well-stocked duty free shops (say Dubai, Singapore et al), where the complete galaxy of chocolates from Ferrero Rocher to Mars, Lindt to Hersheys and Toblerone to After Eights resides. The only thing closer to chocoholic nirvana is one of those chocolate cafes with everything chocolate (they exist, they really do).

5. Finally, a true chocoholic has a tried-and-tested way of coping with the onset of choco-withdrawal. It might be gazing upon pretty pictures on Lindt’s Facebook page (you’re listed as a fan, naturally). Or, maybe popping in your worn DVD of “Chocolat” and watching it for the 502nd time when you feel the low coming on. Or, maybe just keeping a jar of Nutella stashed away at home/work in case of acute emergencies.

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May 1, 2010 · 9:47 am

How to… be politically correct

1.  The simple rule of thumb is this – when in doubt and dealing with anything sensitive, tack on the word ‘challenged’ to your sentence. You can’t go wrong. A guy who can’t see is ‘visually challenged’, a guy who is wheelchair-bound is ‘physically challenged’. But those are the easy ones. The truly politically correct go further. A short person is ‘vertically challenged’, a liar is ‘truth challenged’, you might think this column is ‘humour challenged’… You get the drift.

2.  The essence of political correctness is the assumption that the world is populated with people who have very thin skins and might object to anything at anytime. So, you don’t want to point out any blatantly obvious facts about them — their sex (thus actresses became actors), their race (you really want to tiptoe around this one and become colour bl… er… visually-challenged), or their physical appearance (basically, unlearn everything you learned in your Kindergarten playground).

3.  The often-overlooked ingredient of being PC is zealous self-righteousness. You marshal your forces against the -isms (classism, racism, sexism, et al) and you go out and fight ‘em like this is the Crusades of cultural sensitisation. You do painstaking training modules for bored corporate flunkies. You protest vehemently against the boorish and the profane in popular culture. And at all times remember to piously point the poor, unenlightened un-PC heathen around you in the right direction.

4. Political correctness can also be applied retroactively. As in, you know, little Noddy isn’t having a ‘gay old time’ anymore. And, Golliwogs have been eradicated from the toy chests of little fictional children (poor ol’ Enid Blyton’s books suffered particularly).

5.  In other words, political correctness is the cultural equivalent of sticking your head in the sand. Because, clearly if you change all those mean, nasty words, discrimination itself will no longer exist, and we’ll all live in that Utopian society free of bigotry you know is just a changed noun/adjective away (at the end of the rainbow. By the pot of gold).

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April 11, 2010 · 12:49 pm

To all the Divya Ks out there (Part II)

Those of you who’ve read this earlier entry of mine will know that I’ve had recurrent issues with the number of women (and the occasional man, sigh) with the same name or the same first name-and-initial as I. I get emails from them (when they decide to email themselves deeply private, personal information… without double-checking the email id first). I get email for them, from long-lost friends who’re visiting for just a day and MUST meet them (oops) or from banks that’re convinced I’m Divya Vasudevan K and send me her credit card statement month after month (in HDFC’s defense, they did finally fix it… after my third and most pissy email to them yet). And I’m usually so far down on the Google search results (oh don’t judge me… you all Google your names, you know you do) that I have to enter super specific information and I’m still like five pages down, past results for Bollywood’s sweethearts Divya Kumar Khosla (why couldn’t she just be Divya Khosla? Why?) and Divya Kumar the dancer/actor (nothing personal, I’m sure they’re both lovely people. I’m just a tad bitter), followed by several super-achieving Divya Ks in MIT, Colunbia, et al (it’s really quite impressive how many there are), and then various Divya Ks in IT jobs all over India (how do they tell them apart? Especially in the South, where they all end up being K. Divya? Infosys and TCS alone must have a coupla hundred).

Well (and this is the point of this post… there is one, I swear) it’s all come full circle. And it’s all because of this blog o’ mine :). You see, now, people searching for these other Divya Ks are landing up on my blog. Bwahahahaha. After all these years, having the most common name on earth is paying off. All those times I was the ‘wrong Divya’ and got email meant for someone else and painstakingly wrote back informing them of the error… I’m reaping the rewards, you guys. It’s karma (I’m getting goosebumps). In just the last two weeks alone I’ve had a bunch of cases of searches for “Divya so-and-so MIT” or “Divya Kumar Bollywood” somehow magically leading people to my blog (can you tell I’m slightly addicted to WordPress’ super-fantastic stats and usage info?). AND (this is the big one)… DRUM ROLL… my blog shows up on the first page of Google results for a search on my name!!!! (I think this warrants a rare case of exclamation mark abuse). Go ahead and try it (you know you want to… or not). I’ve quite literally moved up in the virtual world.

So, the moral of the story is… all those of you out there with infuriatingly common names, there is hope. Hang in there. One day, your website too will be rated highly by Google’s PageRank algorithm. And to all the Divya Ks out there… welcome to my blog. (bwahahahaha)

( Note: If there is an unpleasantly gloat-y tone to this entry, please don’t judge the author too harshly. Put it down to years of nominal suffering.)

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April 11, 2010 · 12:19 am

How to… do girl talk

1. The first lesson in girl talk is multi-tasking. Girls came up with the idea of walk-and-talk long before the cellular company did. Also watch-TV-and-talk, cook-and-talk, dress-and-talk, shop-and-talk… you get the drift.

2. You also need to be able to follow multiple conversation threads at once. Any topic introduced before a girl-gang can — and will — branch into at least five related / random conversations within 10.9 seconds. And, good luck attempting to trace the conversation back to its root even a minute later (A Bulgarian professor of discrete mathematics reportedly spent his entire career unsuccessfully trying to find an algorithm for the madness.)

3. No girl talk, of course, is complete without The Giggle. Bursting into loud, high-pitched giggles in any milieu (classroom, corridor, mall, restaurant…) is unique to feminine group behaviour (much like going to the restroom in twos and threes). In other social situations, these same women might be heard laughing delicately, as mummy taught. Not when with the girl gang, though.

4. That brings us to the next big G in girl talk — Gossip. Everyone gossips, of course, men and women, the old, the young and the middle-aged. But girl gangs have it down to an art form. This is the only time you’ll hear silence fall over the group (depending on the degree on exclusivity, salaciousness, etc.) as voices drop to decibel levels a bat would strain to hear, and code language employed that would make an ex-KGB agent jealous.

5. And finally, the one that confounds men completely — confidences. Girls share secrets and personal feelings to a degree that most men can’t fathom. You don’t just discuss what happened; you thoroughly dissect how you felt, how you think the other person felt, how you think the other person thinks you think they felt, and so on. If you just read that last sentence and knew exactly what was meant, you are clearly a veteran of girl talk.

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February 24, 2010 · 9:31 pm

Theyil kadais (Part One): Safari suits and such

There’s this little tailor shop in Adyar I pass on my way home from work everyday. It’s very poshly named Executive Men’s Tailor, and the tagline under it reads ‘Specialist in Safari and Suits’.

Now, it’s true that enterprising entrepreneurs in the the city often provide more than one service from little more than a potti kadai. Your neighbourhood Veena Medicals might both sell Cool Drinks from dusty old glass bottles with the requisite brightly coloured straws (you don’t see those venerable bottles as often any more. I miss them. Stupid new-fangled cans and plastic disposables) and be able to procure for you any medication you need, prescriptions be damned (‘I’ll have one packet Gems and one strip of Erithromycin, please’). Even so, a little theyil kadai claiming to be an expert in both organising safaris and stitching suits is something quite out of the ordinary, you’d agree (‘I’ll book you and your family on a Kenyan safari and throw in three lion-watching suits as part of the package’). Impressive.

Of course, it’s a tad more likely that the man is actually claiming to be a specialist in safari suits as well as other, lesser suits. Disappointing, yes, but that got me thinking about that slowly vanishing sartorial staple of the 70s and 80s in India — the safari suit. There was a time when the safari suit was an absolute must-have for the middle-class man of substance — the government official, the businessman, the school principal. Certainly they were a staple of our movie wardrobes. Every man-about-town owned one — I’m certain there’s a yellowing picture of my dad as a dapper 20-something MBA grad wearing one somewhere in the Family Chest of Bad Fashion Decisions (alongside the one of the tiger-print shirts). Every up-and-comer aspired to one.

Usually all in grey (various shades thereof) or in that awful shade of dark brown that was so popular for bell-bottoms, it was the all-body precursor of the cargo shorts (and you kids thought you were the first to come up with the idea that having a gazillion meaningless pockets was somehow cool). It also always had to be worn a couple of sizes too small — if your paunch wasn’t pressing comfortably against the middle button pre-lunch and actively struggling to break free post-lunch, you weren’t wearing it right (in fact, it is said that many a slim and willowy gentleman felt unworthy of the safari suit given his woefully inadequate mid-section. That resulted in the first and only instance in recorded history of the production of faux-paunches by a company in Bombay. They shut down following a lengthy legal battle with Bappi da who claimed the paunches were modeled on his). And finally, the safari suit was meant for longevity — the older and, of course, tighter your safari suit was, the greater its street cred in the halls of the government office you worked in.

Over the years, however, the star of the safari suit has waned. It’s become something of a joke amongst the chic set — it’s uncool, it’s only for the hopelessly fashion-challenged, they cry. But still the safari suit lingers, and not only in photo albums (right beside the bouffants and the long sideburns). In true old-school Indian style (where you never give up on anything, however patently it’s past its sell-by date, e.g. Lata Mangeshkar), a stubborn set of stuck-in-the-70s gentlemen hold on to their safari suits, whipping it out of the mothballs for that fancy family do or that important meeting. And presumably, if and when these valiant suits do give way, the gentlemen drop by to see Executive Men’s Tailor, Specialist in Safari and Suits. Because in other parts of the world, the safari suit may have become an almost-forgotten fad to be fondly remembered and even celebrated; in India, where the past and the present co-exist in (fairly) peaceful togetherness, it lives on proudly, as do the theyil kadais that specialise in them.

(PS: Would love to know the origins of the safari suit — any ideas? Does it have anything whatsoever to do with actual safaris? Did it evolve from the Shikari Shambu suits colonial-types wore while hunting in barbarian lands?)

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