Have a 'Filmy' Onam

Well,  belated ഓണാശംസകൾ  to all Malayali pals out there. Like any other 'quintessential'(oft recently this word began to have lewd associations for me, thanks to a cranky pal.) Malayali, I had  gala celebrations( or was victimized by it) at college, which consisted of  pookalams comprising of salt, saw dust and a few flowers, an ഓണസദ്യ  and a couple of DSLR pics for proof.
At home, thanks to the umpteen number of TV channels showcasing  newly released( some were even released on the TV!) movies and innumerable interviews with film stars who fondly reminisced their memories associated with, and went on reiterating about their busy lives and tightly packed schedules, I was kept engaged.. This is a favorite part of mine as, if not all of them, very few of them are seen to be affected by this syndrome of talking about things they don't understand or pretending for somebody else. There are beauties with brains in Cinema, but a few make it evident that they are not fit to talk about anything other than lipsticks and sunscreens. Yesterday I cried watching an interview of an actress, who was shocked by the 'newses' of 'misuses'.:p

Conscious of the fact that Onam had been much better when I used to be little, with cousins all around, presided by benevolent grandparents, I realize that like any other festival, Onam too, is about togetherness and warmth. Life hacks might have made life pretty easier, but the price paid is evident. Bliss. From that of the petite but profound pleasures of life. Maybe this is a part of growing pains as well. People abroad celebrate it with much gusto and nostalgia,whereas back at home, we sit glued to the TV screens. Well, it has become a pattern now. The mode of celebration. Who knows, generations later, we would be telling our grand kids the tale of the benevolent king Mahabali and the traditions associated with Onam. "We used to watch films in TV back then you know? Of Mohanlal and Mammootty... What a time we used to have back then..."

GenNow, Dating and the 'Me' syndrome!

The last time I was on Facebook, I received a friend request from someone who apparently seemed a stranger. After looking close at the profile picture, it dawned upon me that I was staring at a second cousin who was hardly ten. Seeing her wall posts which were mainly constituted by Robert Pattinson in his ghastly Twilight look and some other chick flick movie posters, I wondered. What was I doing when I was ten? Baking mud cakes? There were also snippets of conversation between her friends on dating, stalking and what not. Why, I can’t help smiling reminiscing about my own ignorant childhood. The first time I heard the song DATING from the Tamil film Boys, (I might have been 10 or 11 back then) I imagined it as some kind of a game. :-) (Well it is, for the majority). Forget reminiscing, scanning through a yellow newspaper last day, the leading headline was"Dippy has too many dates", as if the sociopolitical structure of the country was dependent on the number of her dates.(And don't ask me who  Dippy is, I don't have the least idea.) Well, as they say, ignorance is bliss,  at least sometimes. 

Millennium’s teens swear without second thought and are adept in mastering them. Many of them swear for no apparent reason, like "Motherfucking Lord, I dropped my pen.." as if not swearing makes them uncultured and primitive.  The shocking truth is some of the Godforsaken parents smile and nod at them, wondering” My kiddo ees speaking engleesh”. Forget swearing, there is a chance of getting branded 'orthodox' and 'hopelessly narrow minded and outdated if you abstain from that. But what about learning to care for others? What about realizing there are other pronouns other than 'me', 'my' and 'myself'? Having always been a person who stood gaping at the smart-alecks who won their way through sheer selfishness, and wondering at times if life isn't just to the meek, maybe I'm saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.

 Capital cities often frighten me and that too, for no particular reason. Years back, way back in my school hood years when  I had to join in a new school in Trivandrum, a pompous girls' one, I was made to sit next to the topper of the class, a quintessential bespectacled one. Clearing my throat I asked her, meekly " Umm.. "Can I have your Geography notebook?"  With a glare, she replied" Can't give you. My notes are for me to study"Flushed, I turned my face to a group of students who were eying me with  sympathetic expressions etched across their faces. I was told later by a bunch of eager girls that she shared nothing with no one in the fear of losing the much cherished first rank. And I was like..." God! These kind of girls do exist" as the only instance I have seen them before was in English chick flicks and Enid Blyton novels.( They can be seen in plenty in Trivandrum, don't ask me why, coz I honestly dunno. I'll tell you this. In one month, I was back at my old school. :p)