“Up in the Air”

30000 feet above the sparkling blue waters of the Pacific wafting through the clouds in a Boeing 747 airliner can spur a man to perform one of two things,

a. Sip some Chardonnay, stretch his arms and legs with a smug smile on his face and hum Ace of Base’s “It’s a beautiful life”…

b. Clench his fists in fury and curse inward at anything and everything while simultaneously praying he’d drop down to earth at that instant, parachute or not.

If you ask me, (a)’s commonplace with those folks ensconced in “First Class”. You know, those lucky mother#$%^ers who strut around the world on company’s dime, firing subordinates as they’re lighting up their fat cigars and indulge in insider trading or splurge taxpayer bailout dollars in weekend retreats. Or… as I like to call them, CEOs. And that #$%^in’ Chardonnay? Most likely was forced down on him because the pretty stewardess thought he hadn’t had anything in the last five minutes.

(b) on the other hand is synonymous with the “Economy Class” (or “Cattle Class” if you’re in a bad mood), which I like to believe exists primarily for them honest-to-God blue collared souls (like me) who’re stuck for 16 cruel hours in the middle between a noisy Asian family, forced to ingest raw vegetables posing as vegetarian food and watch half-baked movies on a constantly flickering entertainment console no bigger than the palm of their hand.

Phew! Boys and girls, welcome to United Airlines flight 187 – nonstop service from San Francisco to Singapore.

Sidebar: (a) isn’t just for the high-rollers you know. Lesser mortals like me would’ve still stood a chance if only they’d re-prioritized a few things in their life. Was that vacation in the Bali Islands really necessary when we would’ve been better off dozing to VCDs? Or for that matter remodeling a kitchen that looked perfectly aesthetic to me? What do you think ‘bout that wifey?

For all my bluster, I knew I wasn’t going to be serenading on a magic blanket or something as I lazily picked up my boarding pass. Coach #37D. In bold too. There’d be no mistake. Any dreams I’d of Flight 187 being a Saudi Prince’s harem-on-wings I’d have to trash them now. Along with that stale coffee I’d been holding since morning.

Myth: My travel agent forked $2000 for this ticket. I’d be treated something close to business class.

Reality: Don’t matter a s**t. Even if you’ve donated a few body parts for this ticket. If yours says “Coach” you’d be lumped together with Joe Public in Economy Class in a heartbeat. That means if he’s miserable chances are you too are about to slit your throat.

As ridiculous as it may seem, every time I’m boarding a flight I fervently pray that the seat(s) next to me should be empty. Like the folks who were supposed to be travelling suddenly woke up that morning and decided “Hey! Let’s make Siva’s life easier. We won’t fly today!” Pfft! #37D wasn’t a window nor an aisle. Smack dab in the middle of a 4 seater, three of whom had already seated and chattering away unconsciously in some language I didn’t understand. I could summon all the Gods I knew and hope for a miracle but that family wasn’t going nowhere. I threw a weak grin and somehow managed to squeeze myself into the middle.

Continuing with the ridiculousness, I also pray for the flight to take wings the moment I’m settled. “Let’s go Frank. We’re running late” like it’s my personal limousine! Half the passengers hadn’t arrived yet and the safety videos were still to come. An excruciating 30 minutes passed before the attendants started waving their arms with a foolish smile on their faces. Maybe the Chinese (I think) guy next to me had thing for the videos or thought the movies were about to begin, I swear I’d never seen anyone so fascinated by these. But what irked me more was his console which was left on the flight navigator channel. You know… that irritating thing that shows the flight progress. Why they even have these is beyond me. It moves slower than a snail and whenever you switch it on it’s always like there’s at least 6 hours or more to your destination. Moreover this isn’t a train journey where you can predict your ETA on the stations you’ve crossed. We’ve just passed Cantonment. Be ready to wave to your uncle anytime now. So why #$%^in’ bother? Heck! If I spoke Chinese or were his brother I’d have argued such. Instead I had a sick feeling it was going to stay on for the entire flight. #$%^ I sighed heavily and rested my eyes. The plane started taxiing out of the gate. Hell, I figured was just beginning her opening credits…

Actually the first thirty minutes after we’re in the air isn’t bad at all. Like a kid who’s licking his lips at the array of candies in front of him I’m still awestruck and fiddling with my entertainment console eager to check out all the fun stuff I hope’s going to keep me from losing my sanity. Thirty movies! But… I’d seen most of them while some others simply didn’t seem to resonate “Wow! Now you can watch me”. Same for the TV shows. Other than the few “Friends” and “Two and Half Men” nothing else was worth a laugh. Heart skipping a beat or two, I nervously navigated to the international section.

“I don’t believe it” I let out an audible sigh. No Tamil movies! I love Tamil, all right? As much as a flag bearer I am for its cause I’m probably the first one to stand on rooftops and proclaim 90% of them movies are pure tripe. On land, that is. Up in the open skies, I deem every frame Oscar worthy and want to soak up every bit of that drivel. Bollywood, I accord similar treatment too, except I couldn’t locate any. There were a bunch of French movies that for some reason pissed me off even further. I have a theory about French wine, French food and French movies. And almost all of them involve the use of the word overrated multiple times in the same sentence. “Iron Man 2”, “Avatar” and “Prince of Persia” for the nth time, I sighed again…

But scrambling for movies is just the first part. The second and most important one is food. Undoubtedly. For reasons best known to the airlines, they’re determined to feed you the moment the plane’s reached cruising altitude. Never mind that you’d just polished a king’s feast before boarding or aren’t in the mood for empty calories. I was on a Lufthansa flight once that left Chennai at 3.00am and they were serving breakfast thirty minutes later! Today I hadn’t eaten a morsel since I woke up and my rumbling stomach was ready to scare the s**t of the next few rows any moment. Heart skipping a beat or two (for the second time in ten minutes), I nervously pressed the “Call Attendant” button.

Myth: My travel agent specifically requested a “Hindu Vegetarian Meal” for my comfort and convenience.

Reality: No she didn’t. Maybe she’s Syrian Orthodox and for all I know the only Hindu meal she’s ever come across is a ‘Chicken Tikka Masala’ at some Indian restaurant.

“What do you mean you don’t have a ‘Hindu Vegetarian Meal’?” I gasped.

“Sir, you didn’t order that and we don’t have any. We’re completely full. I can check to see if we have something vegetarian” As taught, she was equal parts firm and polite, neither of which was helping. I wonder if my poor stomach heard that. Stupid innocent me, I was patting the travel agent last night for doing a wonderful job!

Let the record state that I’m a pure vegetarian in all forms of the word. Never have I glanced at meat or seafood and the most I’ve transgressed is egg, that too not on holy days, Fridays and any other days the wife deems “Not today”. I enter a Subway and demand the ‘sandwich expert’ change his gloves before making my veggie sandwich overstuffed with lettuce and mayo. “For the $5 you’re paying I’m shocked you aren’t asking him to cleanse himself with Holy Water!” my friend K would snicker every time he saw me eating a Subway product.

That’s me, so obviously any beef/chicken/salmon entrée with some fancy sounding French name was a no-no. Ten minutes later an attendant handed me a tray and I almost jumped at the delectable chocolate brownie with frosting on top. The rest, two breads with cheese and margarine spread, baked beans and cut fruits, I barely glanced at those. Even a cow would’ve demanded something better!

“Would you like anything to drink?”

“Yes please. Two glasses of wine” Bring me the #$%^in’ bottle you bitch. I shaved off the breads and hung onto every last bit of the brownie, while more wine came my way. If I wasn’t going to be satiated might as well pass out drunk. Exactly what transpired after an assortment of cheap wine and a few glasses of Jim Bean went down. I started playing “Just Wright”, a B-grade movie about some basketball star who got injured and waited to be drawn into a rich dreamful sleep…

“Hi! I’m Siva. And you must be?”

“I’m Catherine. But please call me Cath”

I was literally counting the seconds until the fair maiden sitting next to me would be distracted from her laptop and headphones and here was my reward. Finally!

“Cath it is. Nice name. Where you from?”

“Oh! I’m a lawyer from Oakland. I’m visiting friends in Singapore for a week. How about you?”

“I’m an Application Process Engineer. But I’ll be the CEO the next day.”

Did I just say that? I mean, did I just say that? Oh my God! That didn’t even sound funny in my head!

“Actually I was just kidding. I’m just an engineer. I hope to become manager in a year. But CEO? I don’t think so” Silly joke that required a serpentine recovery. I hoped my hollow laugh helped her understand that I don’t do this often.

“Hahaha! Funny” Lawyer smarts or not, Cath did know to give out the most polite laugh for the most dumbest joke. Which instantly made me comfortable.

“So what’re you reading there?”

“This is a deposition of a case I’m handling. Pretty interesting stuff really” Why was I thinking that it’d be a Danielle Steele novel, I have no idea. I desperately wanted to say something back intelligent like some legal jargon but clammed up. Where the #$%^ was John Grisham when I needed him most?

“I’ve read John Grisham awhile back and found it amazing”

“He’s good. But most of what he writes is over simplified” I nodded vigorously. Of course Cath, whatever your Highness says.

“I agree. If someone wrote about Application Process Engineers I’d be thinking myself ‘That’s not all we do’” I hesitated. That set the cat out of the bag.

“Hahaha! Funny” 100 to 1, that laughter was all genuine. I sat bolt upright now. Daddy was on his way…

Cath spoke at length about some of her past cases and I listened attentively like some star struck teenager captivated by her dimples and the way she brushed her hair after every few sentences. If I’d been watching my Sex and the City’s and subscribing to Vogue, I would’ve said something like “Hmmm! Prada Spring 2009. Wow! Manolo Blahniks. Nice!” She looked like nothing, except a fashion model in my eyes. Did she dip her voice in honey too or was it really sweet? I’m a sucker for long hair in women and the angel in front of me knew how to wear it. Parted in the middle, braided (or was it plaited?) some of it falling in front over her shoulders. God! Didn’t she realize what she was doing to me?

“Would you like something to drink?” I gently interrupted.

“Sure” I beckoned my favorite stewardess for more mine.

“If this were a Château Margaux ’60 and we were having beef bourguignon followed by Crème Brûlée I swear I’d think we were in paradise” I volunteered. If I was going to project ‘classy’ I figured French would be the perfect way to go about it.

“I agree. But I’m more of a burger girl. I love burger and fries”

Stop teasing me! Was she for real?

“I love them too! You know what I love most? In-N-Out Burger. Officially the best flippin’ burger. Ever” I concluded my speech and slammed the headrest for added effect.

“Gosh! I soooooo love them” We were now almost squealing like schoolgirls and I grabbed the opportunity to high five a few times. Silky smooth skin! Petite fingers! Thank you God for such a wonderful creation. We both agreed that we’d do anything to lay our hands on one right now and took turns bashing the worthless airline food.

But Cath isn’t someone whom you just talk inane stuff with. Push the right buttons and the girl’s the most eloquent and charming Barbie doll you’ve ever seen.

“Do I like history?” The question threw me off guard. “Yes I do. I was a pretty good student in high school” wondering what she was getting into.

“Did you know that the Germans…” Cath has this unique way of looking into your eyes with a trace of smile across her lips when she’s all pumped up before starting a conversation. However long it was I don’t know, I sat back enthralled as she enriched me with facts about German warfare, allied deception etc. Not once did I feel like I was listening to Wikipedia and that’s saying something.

“You speak so well. Please tell me no jury has ever lost you a case”

“Awwww! Thank you. You’re so sweet. But I’m not handling trails until next year”

“Damn! Too bad! You’ve just gobbled your opposition” That part was certainly true. More so, if I were the opposing council. I’d be just standing up saying ‘No questions’ and preparing to get her number after the trial.

“Why don’t we take a walk?” I asked. Last time I checked we were still holed up inside an airliner and not in Central Park, but change of scenery didn’t hurt, right?

“Sure”

And so we trekked the economy class multiple times sidestepping a few daddies putting their kids to sleep, stewardess going about their business, folks waiting in line for the restroom and what not. I might not be no lawyer or historian but gosh darn I can be funny when taking potshots at random people. No seat was left unturned and pretty soon I was in a groove coming up with my theories, analyses most of which I was pulling out my you-know-what. Cath played the perfect Robin to my Batman giggling, laughing and stoking my ego. Jerry Seinfeld, Chris Rock and all those dudes could take a hike. There wasn’t no better joke teller at 30000 feet than me.

Perhaps we’d been walking a long time, because Cath suddenly grabbed my hand and said “I’m tired. Let’s go watch a movie” I’d been talking a lot so I definitely appreciated being taken over. I reached for my bag above and pulled out my kicka** laptop, the 19” Dell laptop. My prized possession at work, it had so many cool features, like an array of processors and RAM to run my simulations. But the only thing that mattered to me was the VLAN movie player and two dozen high quality DVD ripped movies that I’d surreptitiously loaded from my colleague.

“That’s a huge laptop” she gushed.

“I know! The damn thing’s heavier than a rock. It’s a better weapon than pepper spray”

Cath selected the chick flick “Legally Blonde” and I made no attempt to mask my excitement. Cath aside, one other blonde I went bonkers over was Reese Witherspoon.

“You too look alike in so many ways” I observed prompting more laughter. Not done with the gadgets yet, I pulled out my dual ear Bose headphones and handed her piece. One ear is enough, I assured her for soaking in all the sounds.

Memo to self: Cath isn’t just a history buff. Dame knows about movies, fashion trends as much the critics in the business and puts it forth with equal verve as the world wars and civil wars.

Halfway through the movie Cath leaned on my shoulder to “get a better a look”. At which moment my spaceship zoomed from the troposphere into somewhere near Pluto’s orbit…

“Sir! Would you like anything to drink?”

What? Ohhh… “No… I’ll have some more wine.” Where’s Cath?

“Sir, I have just tea and coffee. We don’t serve alcohol for some more time”

And then it hit me. That was just a dream. A #$%^in’ dream. “Please… I need some drinks. I’m having a terrible headache” I couldn’t plead any better. I gulped down the bottle as soon as it arrived desperately wanting to get back into dreamscape to continue talking to the angel. Catherine? Cathy? Cath? I’m coming! After an hour or so of twitching and twisting I gave up. Cath had vanished into the ether and wasn’t coming back, even if I’d consumed an entire liquor store.

In retrospect, that’s what great dreams are. Undeniable joy when they last and heartbreak when they end. But then it wasn’t just a dream, you know. I’d just translated my most thrilling and erotic fantasy into vivid high definition color with the prettiest heroine I could ever find. Did I feel any guilty about it? Definitely not. For Christ’s sake, any other red blooded guy’s fantasy would’ve been similar, except instead of Catherine it’d have been a long legged lingerie model whose every orifice he’d have diligently explored while rolling around in First Class. Mine was simply more vanilla and down-to-earth. Holding hands, rubbing shoulders (once) spiced with ample laughter and thought provoking banter. Again, are any of these amoral? Abso-#$%^in’-lutely not! If I ever I’m in God’s court or the wife’s chasing me around the house with a frying pan, I’m sure all of the above should suffice for my airtight defense.

Instinctively I took out my wallet and prised open my favorite picture, my wife standing in our kitchen smiling as-she-were into the camera. She just blew me away. I love you honey. Always. I changed position several times in my narrow seat until sleep took over for the second time. Goodbye Cath…

I don’t recollect how long I was passed out, but I suddenly became aware of strange smells and a murmur of chatter around. “Breakfast time” someone in the previous row announced. I wasn’t exactly hungry but I’d woken to a steady headache and thought maybe the flight attendants had something that could take care of it. I shouldn’t have bothered. Veggies always get the raw end of the stick.

If you must know, omelets in my hometown are made with at least three eggs and the cook going ballistic with onions, salt and pepper beating the s**t out of it with metal sticks, so much so that an entire street driven by its aroma lines to gobble it up. Omelets on my flight meant just eggs. Yes, they were hot, but that was about it. I couldn’t find any vegetables but I had three packets of salt and pepper. Yippee! The rest of the menu didn’t hold any promise. Apparently United Airlines was so concerned about your waistline and cholesterol that there was no chance in hell you could go off the deep end. Not unless you went crazy with a multi-grain bar and cut fruits.

I spied a look at my Chinese friend next seat and found his console still on the flight channel. Big $%^&in’ surprise! “Maybe you should give this guy half his money back. Dude’s been watching nothing but the flight channel” I so wanted to wisecrack at one of the attendants. But… getting my medicine was a better proposition so I buzzed her again. My favorite fairy appeared in a flash with a bottle of wine and Jim Bean. Sheesh! What if I’d wanted some coffee really? I sheepishly grabbed them and settled back to watch Johnny Depp and his pals kick some police butt in “Public Enemies” There’s nothing more endearing to a battered ego than watching Depp show some attitude and #$%^ with the law. I couldn’t take my eyes off his pretty heroine. Ah! Those luscious red lips. Move over Jolie…

“… We’ll be making our final descent into Singapore” This time it wasn’t some pesky stewardess that shook me up, rather the captain confirming that absolution was less than an hour away. He could’ve given an impassioned speech about the trials and tribulations of maneuvering an airplane earlier but it’s funny what the ears hear they want to hear. I had half a mind to spend a fortune and call my wife to tell her that I’d be home soon but held back at the last instant. I wasn’t landing after spending a year on the moon or something, just arriving in an airliner with a few hundred people, so why bother my alter ego reasoned. I concur.

One last ritual dance that everyone’s got to perform is completing those lame immigration and custom forms. I could fly around the world a thousand times yet can’t seem to remember the 8 character word that is my passport number. If I had my way they should be doing away with these, visa and a whole array of forms and just determine if we were a psychopath or a model citizen (like me) by capturing our eye and thumb prints. That’d be my first order of business when I become Master and Commander of the Free World. Take that to the bank. Right now I would’ve given my left arm for a pen, peacock feather or any other writing instrument. Fifteen foolish minutes later when all around me had gone through multiple revisions, I managed to get hold of one and scribbled mine complete. The flight banked left and I let out a satisfied smile as the top of some familiar skyscrapers came into view. Daddy was homeeeeeeee

What's in a name?

“Shrinkage”

Seven years back one of my close friends Bharathkumar Leelakrishnan got his first job in a Fortune 100 company. Now nobody advised him such, but on the first day, struck by a brainwave he decided to introduce himself to his manager as “Brett Lee”, only one of the premier fast bowlers Australia has produced. Positively shocking, considering it was from a chap who cared for cricket as much as say… curling. A far worse travesty than claiming that he was the son of the Indian President or he was composing a symphony over the weekends. I could so imagine myself snapping at some guy, who jaywalked to me at work and said,

“Hi! I’m Brett Lee. Can I have a database extract?”

“Oh yeah? I’m Shane Warne. I bowl leg spin. I don’t do no extracts. Bainchoth!”

Perhaps I’d have renounced the expletive at the end but my indignation would’ve simmered. Agreed it isn’t a pretty sight watching your colleagues squirm and go through muscle spasms when attempting to pronounce your first and/or last names,

“How do you say this? Leeeee…laaa…kreeshh…naan?”

Dude! It’s just a #$%^in’ name. You don’t have to act like you’re having a heart attack!

but then what else’s a man’s got to do except grin and bear, right? Especially when your dad’s gone all creative cramming his village’s name (and other irrelevant details) into yours. Unless you’re one of them fortunate ones who’s blessed with a first name like Joseph/Robert/Bala that naturally lend themselves to an easy-on-the-lips Joe/Bob/Bala/Balki you don’t got no business shrinking them to something that makes no sense. If nothing, that’ll at least ensure simpletons like me don’t get their hopes up when their barren-than-the-rocks development team gets an email from “Janet” only to realize later that it’s none other than plain Jane Janaki. That too from the same borough as mine!

“Paging Dr. E”

“Janet”s and “Harry”s aside, pray, what on earth does someone do when he’s been bestowed with a name like Ehiyoruonahmenh Oghagboun. Let’s find out now…

While I’m not exactly splitting the atom at work, one of my many requirements is to moonlight as an administrator, which means I’m involuntarily copied on close to a hundred emails a day on servers being restarted, releases installed and patches applied on systems that I didn’t even know neither existed nor cared for in the first place. Even though I’m itching to shoot of a response like “About $%^&in’ time” to at least one of those emails, my reaction has always been passive. Select then en masse and dump them onto my Outlook trash. I would’ve done so that day except an email from Ehiyoruonahmenh Oghagboun caused me to sit up to rapt attention. No, he wasn’t our new CEO taking over our company. Simply put, yet another administrator like me who was going to install the latest Microsoft OS patches on some VM servers. At 6pm MST.

“Ehiyor…” I tried valiantly pronouncing his first name for a minute before I started howling “What a #$%^in’ tragedy”. Blame it on the extra caffeine or diet cokes but I felt a sudden dose of impunity creep through my veins and declared that I was going to hear him say his name. Which I wasn’t sure how, since E didn’t leave no contact information in his email. Perhaps to shield himself from specimens like me, I surmised as I tried calling the Data Center who were equally clueless. Would I like to page the Tier 1 Escalation Support? Sure. Let’s wake up the President if we need to! That proved to be the trick and less than a minute later I heard E’s cell phone ringing sending a tingle through my bones. The same reaction that’d net when one’s managed to track down their high school flame after a decade. Just saying...

“Hi! This is Ehiyoruonahmenh” No cuts, no chops, just like it was spelt, except it was rattled off faster than a bullet train that I couldn’t figure out a darn syllable. Could I manage to hear it one more time?

“Hi! Can I please speak with Ehioru…?” I started off slow, soft and sincere as if asking him for a loan.

“This is he.”

Oh no! “I got your email about the MS patches on the VM servers. Will they cause any downtime in RIO?” Obviously I wasn’t calling him for a dinner date. I had to cook up something and was lying through my teeth praying my giggling wasn’t too apparent.

“No.”

E’s forte wasn’t small talk. E was also not going to address himself in the third person anymore during the call. I’d got the response I wanted, thanked him and hung up.

“Ehiyoruonahmenh” So that’s how it was said. Maybe over a beer or two he’d throw some light on his name while I’d pat him with “Great job! Holding your ground and all”…

“What do I call my baby doll?”

It was just another day at the gym and I was sweating it out like a pig on the StairMaster conducting my nightly battle against the bulge. Someday I dream of a physique carved out of oak but… never mind. Right in the midst of one of Deva’s gana songs my phone rang rudely interrupting me at the 30 minute mark.

“Her family wants me to name her Shanthi Bala. What do I do?” screamed my friend Prashant Kumar into the earpiece. The first “her” was his wife and the second was the baby girl they were expecting in a couple of months. Lately the task of finding a perfect name for his girl was having him in knots.

“What? Why?”

“I don’t know! Their family astrologer said that was a lucky name” I could feel his irritation throwing a vase or something across the room anytime now.

“That’s bullshit man!” I snapped causing me to miss a step and almost topple over. “That’ll never stick. Don’t worry!” I comforted him before reminding him that I had 15 more minutes of hell to suffer through and I’d talk to him later. I wasn’t entirely sold on my reassurance but “Shanthi Bala”? Puh-lease! No way was that going to stick.

Now I love dishing out “life truths” at the drop of a hat and here’s one more from my stable (after my heart rate returned to normal and I’d caught my breath back). The worst thing you can do as a Dad to your kids is not cutting them out of their trust fund. Rather ordain them with a name that’s so uncool that he/she shall be cursing you all the way through teenage.

Case in point: à la Deivasigamani and Kumudavalli. Agreed, these two names are dripping in divinity and probably paying homage to half a dozen Hindu Gods. But let’s take a deep breath and analyze these headlines, first for him,

“Deivasigamani, Casanova of the Eastern World ushers in the new year with a wild party in his swank 300ft yacht. Host snapped with topless Miss USA, Miss Venezuela and Miss Puerto Rico.”

“Sparkling point guard Deivasigamani scores 30 pts dishes 14 assists and shreds the Lakers defense in comeback victory. Starting gig is certainly his!”

“Dr. Deivasigamani, professor of Computer Science at SUNY wins ‘Researcher of the Year’ from Intel for his contribution to Wireless Sensor Networks.”

and then for her,

“Kumudavalli graces Sports Illustrated 2012 cover with Chanel’s new summer bikini line”

“’Yay! I’m getting married!’ An ecstatic Kumudavalli at Beverly Hills with George Clooney showing off her thick engagement rock”

“Noted Obstetrics & Gynecology surgeon Dr. Kumudavalli to address AIIMS class of ’13 today in New Delhi”

Hand to heart, which one of these did you naturally gravitate towards? And how much of that was influenced by the name? C’mon man! Humor me please, will ya?

In my humble opinion with a name like this you can’t go around in tuxedos saying “shaken… not stirred” without sounding unintentionally funny (Ok! Maybe if you shrink it to “Daniel”, but still got to lose the “Mani”) nor sashay on runways to Chanel or Versace. In the same breath, not dribble a basketball between your legs and throw no-look passes nor sleep with Matt Damon. But before you go ballistic and all preachy on me, note that I’m not mocking them or their kind or much worse, consigning them to be bottom feeders. No sir! Definitely not. Humble and respectful all over again, I’d like to note you’re more likely to encounter his publications when browsing through IEEE journals or rush to photocopy his latest textbook on the eve of your semester exams. Just like newly minted mothers all over the country will be tom-toming to their counterparts “Oh! We managed to get an appointment with Dr. Kumudavalli after 6 months”.

Fate isn’t a cruel mistress after all. Three months later I became the proud Godfather of “Manasa”, a cute bubbly bundle-of-joy with a million dollar smile. “Santhi Bala”, “Annai Abirami”, “Krishnaveni” and their ilk thankfully never saw the light of the day. Unless of course, Prashant Kumar’s in-laws were thinking of theatre names in Chennai!

“The Prasanna Situation”

And speaking of names designed to throw you off kilter, here’s an intriguing tale from the memory bank. Confusing names and confounding sexes never got better…

It was one of those bleak dreary Monday mornings when I was trying in vain to savor every minute of sleep before the alarm started howling intent on jerking me into consciousness and dragging me back into reality, when my dad called me out of the blue and said something to the effect of,

“Son! Her name’s Prasanna. Here’s the email address. You better get on you’re a** and contact her right away!”

Of course, Dad never sounds like a four star general barking orders at his troops. Instead in his customary soft, smooth, yet no uncertain and non-negotiable voice, he informed that she was his friend’s daughter and I needed to touch base with her, like yesterday. An executive order to initiate long distance matchmaking delivered to critical acclaim.

Being the selfish prick that I am, I’d have paid lip service to his sermons, hung up and snuggled deep into my comforter eager to make up for those lost minutes. But something wasn’t right.

“Wait! Her name’s Prasanna???” I repeated slowly highlighting “Prasanna” the second time around disbelievingly.

“Yes and here’s her email address…” my dad started off again from his script forcing me to cut him off irritatingly in mid sentence.

“I got her email address. But is her name really Prasanna?”

“Yes”

Followed by the most uncomfortable 30 second pause of my life. That pause could’ve been replaced with a lot of things. Dad could’ve said “Joking! Prasanna’s my friend’s name. She’s Preethi” or even gone with a tamer version of adding a “Kumari” or “Lakshmi” at the end. Nothing! I figured I should’ve rolled off the right side of the bed for either of those to happen. Instead I was saddled clueless with an email address of a “Prasanna” and my dad had hung up ensuring that irrespective of whether that name gave me the kicks or not I was going to throw the first pitch. #$%^

Caught-between-a-rock-and-hard-place moments like these call for a sounding board and mine was my friend Murali, a fellow who specialized in “calling a spade a spade”, especially when it came to me and women. Considering my sleep was shot and heralding the week with a stiff dose of reality couldn’t hurt, I texted him,

“What do you think about a Prasanna?”

Nothing happened even though I kept staring at the phone impatiently for the next few minutes and even shook it a few times to get something out. Wearily I woke up to freshen up. Thirty minutes later all ready to roll I found it blinking and wisecracking with “Dude!!! When did you start batting for the other side? LOL” Real mature!

Obviously he too was thinking that Prasanna referred to nothing except a guy, which made me squirm even further. What the #$%^ was my dad thinking? More importantly, what the #$%^ was her dad thinking when he coined this “brilliant” name? What on earth did he have against names like Preeti, Pavitra and Priya? Questions questions questions… All of which formed the backbone of my introductory email to Ms. Prasanna, though I toiled through multiple drafts to ensure the contents evoked mirth and weren’t downright throwing her dad under the bus.

The next 48 hours were officially a mess, primarily because Ms. P hadn’t emitted any signs of life, which made me almost certain that I’d gone over the top. Which is when I committed my first blunder. Instead of researching on Google like any sane person would do, I leaned on a few scatterbrained (looking back, that is) colleagues and friends (sample size – 10) to figure out who actually held sway over the name and the answer was universal. “We don’t know any damsel named Prasanna. A Madhu maybe, but no Prasanna” Anand even went one step further wondering why I kept saying her “brother”’s name when asked for hers!

Which is when I committed my second and biggest blunder. Letting my evil alter ego conjure up rabid situations packing me off on a crash course to self doom. I’m not a “honey” or “sweetie” guy, so what was I supposed to affectionately address her as? “P” (eww!), “Pras” (yuck!), “Prassy” (???)” when I couldn’t even bear to say her name. And somewhere sometime outside a marriage hall would read “Me weds Prasanna”. Christ! Might as well have added “What a shot in the arm for gay rights!” Almost an entire day of negativity and it was taking its toll on my fast approaching project deadlines. I just couldn’t take it no more. Sigh! I pulled up my laptop and shot out an email explaining why I couldn’t go through with this because I was being transferred to an office in South Korea and hoped she’d understand. How? Since when was South Korea cut off from the rest of the world? Pretty, cute, next biggest supermodel or not, I’d come to realize that she could never be my Ms. Right. Especially with that first name and nothing afterwards…

Fate IS a cruel mistress after all. At least in my case. Less than 10 minutes after I’d dispatched that ill-fated “shoot myself in the foot” email she’d added me as a friend on Facebook. Jack Nicholson would’ve deemed the “Oh my God! Is that really her?” and “Oh my God! What the #$%^ have I done?” expressions written across my face instantly as Oscar worthy. Too late, I swore to myself biting my lip. Closure was achieved less than a couple of hours later when she summarily indicated that she had no enthusiasm in pursuing a long distance relationship (#$%^in’ Korea. Couldn’t I have said South Carolina?) and she’d like this matter closed. Silver lining? NFL was in full swing. Talk about dropping down to earth gently…

Epilogue…

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet."

Immortal words from my main man Shakespeare, regurgitated verbatim from Romeo & Juliet. All of which have made a more contrite me emboldened to go after the next “Sreenidhi”, “Kamal” or “Snehal”. Kidding!

Adios!

P.S.: All names have been changed to protect privacy. Of the author, that is. After all who wants a thousand curses and hexes flying their way, right?

The Evolution of a Lakers Fanatic - An Incandescent Journey

To put it mildly, the trouble with infatuation over sports like Cricket is that babbling about in-swinging yorkers or cover drives can help you score only if you’re on Indian shores or somewhere in the big cities of Australia. Pretty much elsewhere people look at you as if you’re from outer space. Especially here, in the land of “Milk and Honey”. Sample this. You’re out for lunch with your buddies from work Roger, Mike and Mark. Eager to show off you breathlessly exclaim right off the elevator,

“Hey Roger! You watched that game last night?”

“Yeah dude! #$%^in’ felt miserable afterwards. Manny strikes out thrice and Dodgers lose in the ninth!”

(Deflated like a week old party balloon)

“Uh huh… Ok… Actually I meant that cricket match. New Zealand trumped South Africa?”

“What? #$%^ no dude! Mike, you have any idea what the #$%^ he’s talking about?”

Mike’s opinion doesn’t matter, since you’ve already fizzled out like a wet firecracker and are now resigned to listening to the threesome recount for the rest of the lunch in graphic detail about last night’s ballgame, while you pipe in with a few “Wow!” or “Oh man!”s just to reinforce that you’re still sitting at the table.

In summary,

• 
  
   You’ve no clue what channel ESPN is on,
• 
  
  The only topic you can talk about without embarrassing yourself is exception error handling in Java.
• 
  
  Hand on the Bible I’ve never gone out for lunch/dinner/drinks with a gang involving Roger, Mike and Mark. Seriously!

Whoever the poor soul above is, I pray that he still isn’t blissfully watching re-runs of “Friends” and “King of Queens” on TBS, while the rest of the humanity can’t seem to get enough of the Super Bowl or a Yankees – Red Sox playoff series.

Swinging back to me, I’m fairly sports literate now but wasn’t always exactly the “Sports Guy”. Until a few years back the only way I’d be caught dead watching a basketball/football game was if someone came to me and said “Just keep staring at the TV for the next three hours and I’ll give you a $25 Starbucks card”

“Everything in life happens for a reason”

Spinning the memory wheel backwards, I vividly remember the first football game I saw. No fancy touchdown passes or no receiver clutching an elliptical ball and running for his dear life through the length of the field. Nope. None of them ESPN Sports Center highlights. Just a bunch of well fed guys clawing at each other’s throats as soon as a whistle was blown. And almost immediately men clad in zebra clothing threw a yellow towel (which I later learned was a ‘flag’) and rushed onto the field waving their arms wildly. The crowd was cheering and so were my friends. I just shook my head in amazement. And America pays good money to watch this?

If that was football, the basketball game was no edge-of-the-seat thriller either. Ten black men each almost the size of a palm tree and who could easily pass off as each other’s first cousins were scrambling around an orange ball. Two suited old men looking like worn-out Mafia dons were patrolling the sidelines showing fingers (no, not the middle one) and barking orders that no one seemed to pay a heed to. I peered closer into the tiny TV and found to my shock three puny referees scrambling about desperately trying not to get crushed by the giants. Give me a break! Well… then what sport did Michael Jordan play that made people go weak in their knees?

In my feeble defense, at least I gave these two the benefit of an hour before determining them unworthy of my adulation. Baseball? I’d given up within the first few minutes. Yankees vs. Red Sox, it doesn’t get any bigger than this, right? Apparently not. One look at that parallelogram shaped lush green field and it brought back fond memories of the Melbourne Cricket Ground. I was half expecting Sachin Tendulkar to step out and thump Glenn McGrath for a scorching extra cover drive. Instead I got an Asian guy who swung his bat around for a few minutes like he was swatting flies.

“He’s so getting it from his captain and coach” I surmised, watching him make a fool of himself.

Right when I thought he was dead meat and I had it all figured, he suddenly crouched low, barely made contact with the ball and shockingly started ambling to his right. That apparently set off a chain reaction among the lazily standing players on the brown mound (right… “base”) who started running towards each other at breakneck speed. The bar I was in with my friends went abuzz too and folks started cheering, banging their drinks on the table. One lady even stood erect eyes moist, fingers cupped on her lips blowing kisses as if she’d just won an Oscar. Ok! I made the last one up!

“#$%^ yeah! Way to go!” I joined the chorus setting my beer down hard determined to get into the scheme of things. I gently nudged my friend inquiring what on earth just went down.

“The bases were loaded, runners crossed and now we’re in a position to score” he hastily clarified, eyes still glued at the flat screen.

“Oh! So… we haven’t even scored yet?”

No score and the Asian guy was walking back with a not-so-thrilled face, probably because no one seemed to be cheering for his sacrifice. I’d have exercised my vocal chords if that ball had flown out of the park. Whatever! I swear if anyone had offered me a ticket to India at that moment, I’d have gladly gone back and watched South Africa and New Zealand grind it on my dad’s telly out for the next five days.

And that’s why Daddy spent more time salivating over a rental video on Sundays than soaking up America’s favorite pastimes…

“Nothing is inevitable except death and taxes” espoused Benjamin Franklin. I’d respectfully like to add “A paradigm shift in the quantitative thought process of what constitutes quality entertainment” to the mix. The renaissance of which began when I setup shop in Los Angeles…

One thing’s that stuck with me since childhood is my fascination with figures. Yeah… yeah… the fair kind too. But I’m talking digits here. Nothing heavy duty like breaking codes or finding patterns in random numbers, just an innate ability to reel off match figures to nonplussed friends.

How many runs did Sachin score in the 2nd test against South Africa at the Wanderers in 1996? 160(225).

What were Waqar’s figures in the semifinal against Australia in the ’01 Natwest Series? 10-2-59-6.

If I could do this for matches that took place years ago, then regurgitating box scores of games less than a week old should be child’s play, right? Question was, what game? The answer wasn’t difficult, thanks to a beaming Kobe Bryant plastered all over the Los Angeles Times the next day, arms outstretched as if he’d just conquered Russia. Bryant had single handedly outscored the Dallas Mavericks with a stellar 62 points by the end of the 3rd quarter sending them to one of their most embarrassing losses. Thank you!

• 
  
  Possess rudimentary knowledge of the Lakers (know who Shaq is, won a ring a few years back) Check
• 
  
  Team’s still winning games with pizzazz Check
• 
  
  More than half of the state goes gaga over them Check

When in Rome… Goodbye Dodgers, Angels, Trojans or even Long Beach State Volleyball. Daddy was now drawn hook, line and sinker into longest running soap opera in Hollywood.

It’s fascinating how the same games that seemed so lackluster earlier could be so enthralling now that you’ve a faint idea what’s going on. The learning curve was much easier than I thought. 90% of the offense ran through their ringleader Kobe Bryant who seemed intent on contorting his body in every imaginable way and taking every difficult shot that existed. People couldn’t get enough of yelling “Yes! Kobe!” or “MVP” every time he was on the court, which only spurred him on to put on a show every night. Passing the ball wasn’t in his dictionary, at least yet, so most of those early games were a dissertation on how much you could score and make people scream.

Special Mention: The 81 point spectacle against Toronto Raptors on Jan 22, 2006. 81 points of the highest order designed to lead your team to victory when you were down by 18 and dead in the water in the 3rd quarter. For a recent convert like me, watching it unfold before my eyes I kept thinking “This s**t is impossible. I can’t believe he just scored from that position” as goose bumps erupted all over my body. Strangely, I wasn’t tearing my throat out. Instead I sat huddled in a corner arms crossed with a beatific smile facing the TV like a college grad who’d just toked up.

81 points: 28/46 FGs, 18/20 FTs 7/13 3ptrs 6RBs 2ASTs 1BLK.

Perhaps that’s when my in-game ritual was born. Whenever the team’s dead in the water I mute the TV, switch off all lights and curve myself into a fetal position. Sounds radical all right, but trust me, the team always mounts a furious comeback. Sometimes they win, sometimes they lose, but faith ensures they never rollover and play dead. Ever!

And for those games that the Lakers were winning or played by other marquee teams, their broadcast is always about the drama. Three men talking incessantly for almost three hours covering the game 60% of the time and the rest 40% talking about what was going on with the team, league and pretty much anything else that came to their mind when the microphone was on. So before the final buzzer you’ve been told what each player did for Thanksgiving, what they got their moms for their birthday etc. Sounds cute right? Well… for me who’d already devoured this online it was a nightmare listening to it again. Can we not discuss the last few offensive plays? Didn’t someone miss a defensive assignment? I mean, Kobe’s great but giving him three uncontested layups in a row means someone stunk, right? I probably had to sit in the coaches meetings to get that stuff…

Onto Act Two: Hello Fantasy Basketball.

(Insert stupid joke)

No! This isn’t where we fantasize about the players and talk about it!

Keeping things simple, you gather a bunch of likeminded basketball crazies, form a league where each constructs a team of 12 players and go head-to-head every week to determine the winner in all categories – points, rebounds, assists, steals etc. 2006 I first signed up, officially gaining entry into the world of the “Big Boys”. Incidentally, nothing more than my high school and college buddies who’d happened to have a two year head start in the world of pro sports (read Anand, Aravind, Sriram, Shankar among others).

 

Operating with your fantasy team requires round the clock access to all details on your players. Thanks to websites like Yahoo! Sports, Rotoworld, ProBasketballTalk who religiously updated their news as much as when a player sneezed and which I checked at least 5 times a day, I’d say I was pretty much covered.

(overheard in the cafeteria)

“I wonder if Kirilenko is playing today?”

“Oh no! AK-47’s got a sprained thumb and strained ligament. That stuff’s going to keep you out at least 2 weeks. Go for Millsap instead”

Prognosticating with a straight face as if I were the team doctor! AK-47? I was now calling them by their nicknames as if I’d been playing ball with them since kindergarten. Well… If any tool could transform a dumb $%^& into a know-it-all, this was certainly up there. Of course having Bryant as your #1 pick in the draft two years in a row certainly helps. That, and a collection of nobodies whom everyone had either no clue about or given up on. Thanks to a leap of faith and favorable assurances from newspapers (Sacramento Bee, Indianapolis Star etc.) I picked them only to watch them outperform every week. Dutifully never missing any opportunity to rub it in the faces of my more experienced compadres who wondered how I’d struck gold. Work ethic son…

 

All this huffing and puffing is great but you know, there was something gnawing inside reminding me that I was still only a “Laker Fan”. To become a fanatic (maybe even a diehard one) I had to crank it up a notch. That meant I had to cough up dough and start following the team on the road. Quite naturally, everyone except me thought I’d gone s**t crazy. I’d never been so sure of anything else in my life. Considering that we play quite a few games in the west coast in cities like San Francisco, Sacramento, Phoenix and Portland, given my limited resources going over there screaming and in general making a darn fool of myself wasn’t that much of a stretch.

Nothing more noteworthy than the game in Portland two years back that I’d gone to with Anand, his wife, Aravind and bunch of other friends. Everyone around me was a Laker hater and thought Kobe Bryant should be burned at the stake, if not already. The only way I could tune them out was by taking a few puffs of you-know-what, which I certainly did. By tipoff I was high as a kite and realized that I was the only one in our section wearing some piece of identifiable Lakers clothing. If there were other fans they were as yet to come out of the closet. And that’s when it happened.

The Blazers won the opening tip and the lead guard Roy was now setting up the offense. Right at that moment, I stood up triumphantly and announced “Defense! Defense!” making no bones of the fact that I’d come there for one purpose and one purpose only, “Support thy Lakers”. I swear to God, at least a thousand people were shocked and stared at me wondering who on earth I thought I was. Anand certainly thought I’d lost it and slunk lower into his seat dragging his wife along. She refused to look at me and kept reminding us that someone was going to hit us with a hot dog!

Hot dog, popcorn, soda I couldn’t care a damn. I was already in seventh heaven. Everyone wants a piece of the Lakers when they’re squaring off against them and the Blazers were no exception. Dazzling plays, the constant back-and-forth between fans made things even spicier. As is the wont, I had a lot to say after almost every possession. Good plays were rewarded with a “Fantastic sir!”, “Well played boys! That’s the way to go!” and even the ubiquitous “MVP” chants whenever Bryant went to shoot a free throw. Never a doubt that I’d came off like a proud English teacher watching his wards perform a school play. Bad Plays? Let’s just say we’re glad none in our section (and the ones adjacent too) save for my entourage didn’t understand my mother tongue. Lamar Odom bore of the brunt of my beautifully strung together choice expletives that in hindsight I’d like to recall. Sorry L.O.!

By 9.30pm we’d lost the game and I was reminded yet again by a 100 odd people that Lakers suck. For added measure Aravind grabbed a bunch of random guys and informed them that I’d driven from Los Angeles just for this which made them go even wilder. “Take me to the nearest bar” I grabbed Anand’s wife and pleaded. Nothing like some Jack Daniel’s to get me back to the penthouse and forget about the a** kicking that we’d received. Good times good times…

Somewhere along the way I’d realized that I was afflicted with multiple personality disorder. Now I know what you’re thinking. I wasn’t smearing my face with paint, donning a cape and slashing people’s throats by night to come back to a desk job during the day. Simply a metamorphosis in the overall psyche and demeanor after the outcome of a Lakers game.

Victory? I’m the chirpiest son of a b***h around. It takes me at least half an hour to wipe that smile off my face, even longer if it’d been a couple of overtimes, comeback victory etc. My adrenaline’s through the roof, I get substantial work done in record time, go to the gym and sweat it out like a pig without feeling a thing and finally come home to watch the highlights at least five times over three different sources (SportsCenter, NBA TV, Yahoo! Sports video).

Loss? Stay away from me as I’m the biggest sourpuss in the vicinity. Getting blown out from the beginning or right after halftime it’s much easier to deal with those. But close ones that boil down to the last possession or two, it’s that much harder to take. Thanks to your cousin or a few friends who’d like to continually remind you by sending texts like “Say, were you watching the game?” or “Please call me when you’ve stopped crying” Seriously?

Honorable Mention: Loss to the Celtics – Game 4 of the ’08 NBA Finals. My therapist (which is me, by the way) has advised me to often talk about it as its cathartic. I don’t even know what that word means! But I thought I’d endured my share of heart wrenching defeats after India folded belly-up against Australia in the 2003 ICC Cricket World Cup. No! Lakers in an amazing display of cluelessness ensured that they’d take the cake. How do you lose a game at home when you’re up by 31 points in the 2nd quarter, the entire fan base is screaming wild and thinking the Celtics aren’t going to show up after halftime because they’ve been embarrassed enough already?

It wasn’t the amateur display on the court that made matters worse. Rather the aftermath. Flurry of calls from friends, colleagues that started pouring in even before the result was official. I threw the phone away in disgust and ran off to the beach. At 9.30pm! I drummed up every imaginable “In the Devil’s Doldrums” scenario to continually kick myself under the bus. As I begun to feel better I realized there were still 3 games to go and that we still stood a chance. Pfft! whom was I fooling? Even I knew a 3-1 series score meant a death knell. Trudging back home way past midnight I even wondered if I should pray at the Malibu Temple tomorrow for a Lakers victory. Never mind! Lord Balaji too had probably smartly bet on the Celtics anyway!

It took me almost three days of wallowing in self-pity before we finally beat the Celtics on Sunday. There weren’t a deluge of calls, just a. But at least I could answer them and say “hope” without getting laughed at… There, I feel much better now. Thank you Doc!

(Present Day – Somewhere in the Bay Area, CA)

“How much longer?” I snapped, fidgeting and getting frustrated by the minute.

“We should be there in 15 minutes” drawled Avinash taking a deep breath from his cigarette for added effect.

“I can’t believe I’m missing the game” I hissed further. Didn’t matter even if I had a meltdown in the middle of the freeway. I wasn’t going to get a hug or nothing like that. I still had to drive him to Santa Clara to pick up his car while the rest of America watched the Colts dissect the Jets defense.

“Since when are you into football?” he asked, dripping with both sarcasm and surprise.

“Long time baby! You’ve no idea”

True, on both counts. A couple of years back, thanks to a crash course from my brother and cousin, two self-confessed football-aholics I realized that following a much smaller pigskin (the football, that is) carted around the field wasn’t that bad at all. Agreed, there were more men and more rules, but as long as I’d learned the vital ones, that’s all that mattered. Fantasy football entered the equation and pretty soon I was flying high mucking up my Sundays doing nothing except vegetating in front of the TV watching NFL. Half a dozen million men in this country would rightfully approve…

Me, Avinash and plans should never be used in the same sentence. That’s why instead of heading to the hotel at least 30 minutes before the Saints and Vikings tipped off we were scrambling to find the first available bar in Santa Clara. Barely making it I bumped into a TV showing some obscure horse race.

“Awesome ‘Princess Diamond’! Way to go beauty!” I blathered without thinking.

“Machannnnnn! You follow horse racing too? Wow!” Avinash’s eyes were now wide open and the words were dipped in nothing but sincerity, adulation and admiration. Right at that moment I’m guessing he’d have coronated me as “The Sports Guy”.

“Definitely! She won the Kentucky Derby in ’07 and ’08. I’m going to Louisville next month and betting $500 on her and her sister. Surefire wins pal!”

Of course I said nothing like that.

“I’m just kidding man! I don’t know what the #$%^’s going on” I patted his shoulder reassuringly and lead him to our table…

Daddy might be the jack of all trades, but he’s the master of one. One that involves unrivalled unwavering and unquestioned fanaticism towards his favorite team, the Los Angeles Lakers. And pray, what might get to drag him away from a game?

• 
  
  Nuclear Holocaust
• 
  
  8.5 Earthquake

(b) and not (a). Considering all the adjectives used thus far, I’ll stay transfixed to the idiot box my skin peeling off all around me, watching Kobe sink another eye-popping field goal.

Hallelujah!

(Thevidiya) Paiyya!

Boy bumps into girl. Boy drives girl to Mumbai on a lark, gets jerked around by a bunch of illiterate idiots (ahem, gangsters) for causes ranging from stupid to inane. Boy kicks ass regardless. Boy brings girl home to friends who say that he loves her. Boy kisses girl. Crowd heaves a huge sigh of relief and rush for the exits.

Save for the last line, the rest in the hands of an experienced ad film maker would’ve made for a prizewinning promotion for an automobile, considering that more than half of the film is shot inside a car.

Mitsubishi Lancer: Keeping you and your beloved safe from bad roads and bad guys.

See where I’m going with this? Precisely what should’ve happened when the director pitched this 30 second brainwave to anyone who cared. Instead we’re assaulted with a close to three hour exercise in bad writing and bad screenplay that satisfies no one or nothing. Think of it as if you’d just endured a six hour road trip with an obnoxious cast, stuck in the back seat listening to bad songs and not stopping enough to pee or take a puff. Ladies and gentlemen, say hello to “Paiyya” playing in a theatre near you.

“Paiyya” is a craftily woven tale of a boy and a girl who discover each other during a momentous car journey they undertake from Bangalore to Mumbai. Deftly weaving through thugs and underworld gangs that desperately want to settle old scores the boy stands heads and shoulders above the ensuing madness protecting his precious fair maiden. Employing a heady cocktail of humor, romance and intrigue the director engages the audience in a visual extravaganza that transforms the irrepressible happy-go-lucky boy into a committed responsible person. Did we mention die-hard romantic too? “Paiyya” - A fairytale road trip through many a mile to conquer the heart of his soulmate.

You realize all that I said above is baloney, right? Exactly the stuff I’d have churned out if I were the director’s brother or were being paid a 100 grand to say something nice about the film. Neither is the case. I am just a dumb fool who’d been duped off $30 (two tickets!) and four hours of precious Saturday nightlife. So excuse me if I sound a li’l pissed…

In all fairness I knew we weren’t going to watch an epic when I suggested to my friend we could catch “Paiyya” that night, hoping that she’d shoot the idea down as fast as I’d said it.

“Yay! I haven’t watched a Tamil movie in a theatre in a long time. Let’s go!” she screamed.

Groan! “Well… It’s not an Oscar movie or something. So chill!” I quickly clarified.

“Karthi”, the hero couldn’t have agreed more, since he’d insinuated so in all interviews that this film was his debut as a “commercial hero”. He might’ve as well said “I’ll be doing absolutely nothing except prancing around with a girl wearing designer clothes, hanging around with a bunch of friends cracking jokes and maiming a dozen people at a time with nothing severe than a punch or a kick. So if you want to leave your brains at home and question nothing, fine by me.”

“Heroine’s Tamannah” my friend blurted suddenly looking up from my laptop.

“Really? Oh wow!” Yay! I was doing everything except jumping up and down to convey my enthusiasm.

And why wouldn’t I? Tamannah was the petite 20something heartthrob who’d taken tinsel town by storm with a complexion that’d give milk a run for its money. That girl had been haunting my dreams and fantasies the past month or so ever since I’d chanced on her wallpapers on an online gossip website.

“Let me fix the Wireless. I think it’s awfully slow” I said snatching my laptop from her without waiting for an answer. Nothing was wrong with the Internet except that if I didn’t sneak a picture of Tamannah at that instant I’d have put a bullet through my head. Pictures like these, topless ones of Kate Moss, Cindy Crawford and Sports Illustrated models in bikinis don’t lay around on the desktop for public display. Every self-respecting red blooded straight man like me has their secret stash that’s guarded more ferociously than ancient Egyptian mummies. C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\temp is a hard one to remember and an even harder one to navigate to with an excruciatingly slow laptop as mine. Couple of minutes later I was lost into two dozen photos when she screamed,

“Hey!!! Is it fixed? I was watching a movie” causing me to almost drop the darn laptop.

“Uh huh! I’m reconfiguring the adapter now. Can you go check the modem?” I let loose a string of lies eager to dispatch her to a corner of the living room. I quickly logged onto YouTube to check some familiar videos all of which I felt brought back some of my sanity.

“Tamannah smiling coyly”.

“Tamannah dancing in the rain”.

“Tamannah draping a saree and lighting a lamp”

Girl was $%^&in’ gorgeous. Logic, common sense, coherence, anything else in the movie could take a hike. Yup! I was sold.

To wit, watching a Tamil movie in Los Angeles isn’t exactly like waltzing into the nearest AMC theatre and reclining on those plush leather seats. Overflowing Cold Stone ice-cream to stuff your face with and bombarded by sounds from all sides, courtesy of that Dolby surround sound, yeah… none of that. Ordeal would be a better word, considering the experience’s anything but worth reminiscing.

The venue more often than not is a dimly lit Dollar cinema tucked away in a nondescript corner of the city that shows all Hollywood movies at least two months old for the grand price of $1. “Paiyya” and its Telugu/Malayalam counterparts however goes for as high as $15! A fact painfully made aware when I realized the $20 bill I was waving at the middle aged bespectacled lady behind the counter wouldn’t get us through.

“Oh wait! Here’s my student ID card” I shamelessly pulled out my faded Sun Devils card. 8 years since leaving ASU and I wasn’t done pulling this charade at every movie theatre I went to. Saying nothing she grabbed and stared at it front and back as if trying to crack a code.

“Is there a treasure map in there?” I laughed. Nobody except me seemed to be interested in that joke.

“This is old. You’re too old to be a student” she gruffly handed it back. There isn’t exactly nothing you can say when someone calls you old and a liar in the same breath. Precisely why I gave up after the first two syllables. “I should’ve shaved today” I consoled myself in Tamil to my friend still buried in her Facebook messages.

“Do you have your ID dear?” she now turned to my friend, smiling for the first time in three minutes.

“Um… Actually I’m a Professor. I teach” she shot back with an equally steely smile letting the words hang in there for a few seconds. Enough time for me to swiftly turn around to gauge my opponent’s reaction. Damn! If Miss Spectacles was shocked I saw none of that. Acting as if she’d been using this line against teachers all the time and knew exactly what she’d get. Eager to flee the scene I forked up the necessary $10 and waved off any refreshments.

“Creamy Pista milkshake” I explained pointing at the tall cup I was holding.

Little did I realize that in a few moments it’d be finding its way down the dustbin. Since there was no way in hell it would’ve cleared “theater security”. That’s right. Those two men and a woman religiously checking with a fine-toothed comb everyone’s person to ensure no outside food was brought in.

“Company policies” answered the burly guard with a baton as he motioned me to throw it away.

“But… This is $15. It’s actually my dinner sir. Please…” I quivered knowing I’d have better chances against a brick wall. After all why wouldn’t I? For Christ’s sake this wasn’t a McDonald’s McFlurry or whatever. I’d handcrafted this baby for 10 minutes throwing in three ice creams, a whole array of nuts and put it through a blender twice to achieve the right texture and composition. Heck! I could’ve been holding a 100 year old bottle of French wine but there was no way in hell the stupid #$%^in’ management of this rundown theater was going to heart melt. “Here, you do it yourself” I sighed and handed it over to him who trashed it in a second without blinking.

Du siehst den Wald vor lauter Bäumen nicht – “You can’t see the wood for the trees”. Obviously I wasn’t thinking in German, but loosely translated in my case it means I couldn’t miss Tamannah for the ice cream shake. Wouldn’t and shouldn’t too, as I rushed back to the counter to find something to eat. Movie, game or concert there was no way I was going to sit through one without guzzling or chomping one down. I knew I wasn’t going back to a buffet but still the washed up hot dogs, nachos and watered down sodas scared me. And this cost $10? Christ! I was getting #$%^ed from all sides! Finally I entered the dungeon (yes, the theater) and found my friend stuck somewhere in the middle between a bunch of families.

“Let’s go someplace more comfortable” I shouted. The front rows were empty and no one would bother us there. Arms and legs spread across adjacent chairs like a passed out drunk I couldn’t wait for the movie to start…

“Paiyya” began by making the right noises. A recently graduated “Karthi” living with his friends/roommates in Bangalore was having a blast blissfully unconcerned about finding a job. His friends/roommates though seemed more intent on snagging him one and I didn’t understand why. It’s not like we were told that he’d saved their lives in a boating accident or his dad owned a software company that employed them.

Just a few seconds of his female friend and I couldn’t stop throwing curses at her. Bad curly hair, gruff voice, horrible dresses she looked every bit an overbearing matron that everyone hated, bossing our poor guy more than his mom ever would. Why couldn’t this have been a fair buxom girl instead I wondered as I impatiently bit my nails waiting for my object of fantasy to appear.

Almost as if on cue the screen brightened a few notches and flower petals adorned the street as she sashayed in with a million dollar smile plastered across her face.

“Tamannah’s here” I joyfully screamed, punching my friend.

“I can see that!” she barked going back to her ice cream. Among the myriad things a woman’s purse can hold, a certain malai kulfi just got bumped to the list.

Tamannah’s arrival certainly picked up the pace. Quite soon in an intriguing stretch of events her annoying uncle or whatever was let go off in a petrol bunk and Karthi and her were on their way in a maroon Lancer. The destination immediately changed from Chennai to Mumbai thanks to our lady’s pleas. Not that it really mattered to him. He was driving smiling smug as if he’d won a round trip to the moon, while she was parked glum in the backseat as if a spider was crawling up her behind. The road trip had officially moved into second gear…

Which is where I think the movie scored its highest. The chemistry, camaraderie (and whatever else adjectives can jump in) between the two were undeniable. Funny retorts going back and forth, tongue-in-cheek humor the next hour or so had it all. For all the growling and heavy duty acting Karthi did in his first movie (Paruthi Veeran) he was undoubtedly having a blast here. Totally laidback with his sarcastic comments and constantly checking out my girl in the rearview mirror nary a focus on the road ahead. Me and almost the entire crowd laughed out loud when Tamannah pitifully explained that she was on the run because her vicious dad was trying to forcibly marry her off to some rogue. Couldn’t the director have thought of a less incredible reason? I could’ve even accepted a “I failed my Plus 2 and I’m running away from my dad because he’d brand me with a hot iron!” Thankfully Karthi commiserated with us by chuckling and flashing his pearly whites which were beginning to look as wide as hers.

Quite a few scenes stood out and made me sit up, especially the one where they went into a restaurant. Tamannah didn’t want nothing while he started off as if he was planning to feed everyone around. The moment the food arrived she attacked it with such gusto that he was forced to fend for himself with an idly sambar. It was both cute and funny and only reaffirmed that in the land of women no means yes and “not hungry” means “I can eat a horse”.

The next one was where they helped an IT professional facing some engine trouble. Tamannah cooed to the hapless guy in Hindi almost sweeping me off my feet while Karthi stood there with that perfect quizzed expression wondering if they were cussing him. Not to be outdone moments later he gave it back all to the 9-to-5 dropping him abruptly in the middle of nowhere when he realized that things were getting a tad too close between him and his girl. Once again humor and body language saving what could’ve been a disastrous acting job.

Time for a rain song we all realized and the commercial movie didn’t disappoint us. Skies darkened, water poured and she was off pouting and preening soaking wet alternating between pink and yellow skirts looking as resplendent as before.

“This is where I get my money back” I cheerfully clapped turning to my friend. Karthi, Tamannah or those cute kids dancing along whatever, she was engrossed and couldn’t care less for my enthusiasm.

If there was an irritant in these otherwise frothy proceedings it was Tamannah’s dad’s henchmen who kept sprouting all over the highway looking to parcel her back to Chennai. The director’s vision meant these menacing dudes played a prominent subtext so I couldn’t argue. Even if I thought they were overweight, one too many unnecessary and was waiting for their Mahindra Scorpio they were travelling in to break an axle under all that pounds of flesh.

“All good things have to come to an end”. Or to an intermission in our case, when Karthi who’d just finished off beating the living s**t out of ten men each brawnier than the other and announced to the camera (hence, audience) “I have a past too!” What the #$%^ I had a sickening feeling that we were going to be seeing more fist cuffs than French kisses in the second half.

Intervals in India and elsewhere run for at least 10 minutes. Enough time for the men folk to empty their bladders, smoke a couple of cigarettes and make a general nuisance of themselves filling up the cafeteria with second hand smoke. Three drags into my cigarette I had a sneaking suspicion that wasn’t going to be the case here. I rushed past security like a madman only to find the second half had just begun. As is the wont with all Tamil movies “start with a bang and end in a whimper”. I crossed my legs in agony to watch the director devolve his thus-far-impressive work into a sordid tale of meaningless violence…

For those of you who haven’t tuned out yet, a couple of years back on an innocent visit to Mumbai Karthi got into a scrape with a hoodlum who was courting trouble. Rightfully so, he punched him senseless and then followed it up by doing the same to his leader Milind Soman. Disinterested, old, tired and with a bad Hindi accent I couldn’t help notice he looked nothing like that strapping bare chested guy who made hearts race in “Made in India”. Why he when any Joe Blow off the street could’ve hammed it up was beyond me? Back to Soman… He’d now issued an APB and was roaming around with the sole purpose of finding Karthi and repaying the favor. What a #$%^in’ joke! The boy and the girl were now being chased through the streets of Mumbai by a dozen odd idiots and we had nothing else to do except watch Karthi do a painful Bruce Lee impersonation.

Any hopes I’d of Karthi and Tamannah continuing their whirlwind romance were immediately squashed. Both had little time together and to make matters worse his obnoxious friend kept popping up talking incessantly. Sadly for what passes as comedy these days. Towards the end the director attempted to throw in some suspense as well making us want to ask “Is Tamannah who she really claims she is?” You’ve got to be kidding me! The only question I wanted to ask was “When is this trash going to end?” Mercifully in a few minutes once Karthi was done finishing up the Pièce de résistance - the grand fight at the marketplace where both parties united for a common cause - to break his bones. An entire array of makeshift shops were destroyed, the bad guys suffered broken limbs, jaws, bruises and whatnot while our hero stood tall and proud like he’d just conquered Mt. Everest. Whatever! His fair maiden secure, the pair flew back to Chennai to their friends to make it official. Whew! Thank #$%^in’ God!

Unsolicited advice to the Director: Sir, next time you want to make a “commercial” movie, let’s just stick to the driving and joking around, shall we? Rip off a few Hollywood DVDs, throw in two more friends to fill up air space and cram it up with jokes and catchy songs that make us laugh and sing together. If you think a trip from Bangalore to Mumbai isn’t enough material, feel free to extend it to Goa, Delhi, Calcutta or wherever else your Highness pleases. Oh! One more thing. Beating a dozen people with a club, cycle chain or nicking them with scissors is so 80s. Unless you’ve a tale of international espionage and terror leave the violence to James Bond and Matt Damon.

“Thevidiya Payya” I sighed, loud enough for a few folks behind me to hear as I exited the theater after what seemed an eternity.

“Is that at you or your namesake in the movie?” my friend asked amidst peals of laughter.

“Me of course. That bugger got the girl. I didn’t!”

Peace!