You want privacy? You wish!!!

Privacy invasion hit me hard… But luckily for them it hit me on the funny bone.. (Frankly, I’m not sure if that is supposed to make me feel that things are funnier or less funnier but let us go ahead with my initial assumption.). I have only heard of the risks of putting up your pictures for all of FaceBook to see. And also of the horrible things that is carried out in “Yossarian Speaks”. But a deadly combination of both over a period of time, along with a nonsensical game show by a renowned (they wish!) TV channel ended up in quite a hilarious infringement of any privacy laws that may be in this country.

I shall introduce the situation from a first person perspective. Imagine yourself to be casually having a good weekend with your family. As all families who complain about the television ruining the family unity, you are all gathered around it in an unnaturally abnormal and apparently non-evident sense of unity to watch some particular show. And as the whole room looks on, there pops up your picture.. right there! Right when everyone is watching, you are on TV! And you have no damn clue how! Worse yet, you are on TV coz the channel wants the viewers to wonder, if you are the son of some random guy!! No no… NOT the son of YOUR father but supposedly more honourable that you have a 0.25 probability of being the son of that famous guy on screen. Now in case some of you do not have the extreme imaginative capabilities required for this exercise. Here is a sample video of how it might look if you were me :

Subtitles :

Only cute lady on the whole set (from now on CL) : Who is the son of Murali Mohan? Option A

CL : No? you don’t know the color of his jeans?

Lady in brown saree hiding her goatee(??) (LG) : *shakes head* B

CL : Option B

LG : hmm…this looks less random.. let

me see C

CL : Option C

- Nefdyl Cold: Blah blah blah blahu>

CL: Do you have matching jeans for that shirt? Or atleast some lungi mayb?

..

Option D

LG: yes yes…matchin lungi for this I have.

CL : Ok..Option B and Option D have nothing to do with Kerala

LG : I miss option A.Can I see all 4 pictures?

Program editor : I’m so smart!

Viewers : Wow..all famous people..so lucky fellows, no…

Me: WHAAAAATTTT!!!!

And while this whole ordeal is happening the rest of the family watching with you can be picturised as below:

Well so that's that i'm apparently a TV star now, thanks to FB,google and a side dish usually had with dosa or vada (http://yossarianspeaks.wordpress.com/2010/01/15/gossip-girl-3/).

*Video courtesy Youtube; Picture courtesy : Family guy on my hard disk (And that's how it's done!!)

Dial C for Cheta...

It isn’t what is said that matters but what is meant. The tone alone can convey what you are trying to say even without the words being right. And that is how a person can survive in whichever linguistic region he goes to….*SCREEEECH*

Atleast that’s what I thought until I had that stupid incident on a bus in Chennai. There I was peacefully….oh wait..let me get that right. There I was nervously standing in the bus with one hand holding the top bar, another on a seat trying hard not to get too close to the neck of the person sitting there. Aw..comon.you know what I’m talking about. That posture you maintain in the bus, when you don’t know where you are supposed to be getting down. With your head somewhere below the elbow of your raised hand , looking out like one of those hens they show on cartoons scratching the floor and trying to find at least one place which looked familiar! Well, there I was standing in the above mentioned manner when I happened to see an unexpected face at a bus stop we just passed. All excited to spot a friend out there, I thought I’d get down there, chit chat with the old chap and catch the next bus. Being a mallu, quite naturally as the blood that runs through my veins I started : “Chetaaa..Chetaaa…Stop..Chetaaa” (Ask that mallu friend of yours..). Baffled by the absolute disinterest shown by the the “Cheta” on board, I thought for a while and it hit me. Ofcourse! I was in Chennai.. No one is a cheta there!! “Anna..stoooopp..Anna”… And I had hit the right note! The bus stopped at once and a very pleased guy bounced out of the bus. But sadly enough, this whole process and the thoughts involved did not take place at the lightning speed I might have preferred. In effect there I was, stuck somewhere in Chennai with not my friend or my destination in sight.

Setting aside all happy memories of that day, let me get to the point. Whatever they told you about being in a new place was a BIG lie! NO! The first thing people learn in another region is NOT how to swear. That would come somewhere between the first thing and “How are you”. The first thing anyone learns is to call a stranger on the road – an auto driver, the shopkeeper, the guy who you want to ask directions to... I’ve seen my share of people visiting Kerala and besides the occasional buddy of ours who was taught completely irrelevant and censored stuff that even I didn’t know then, almost everyone else knew one word in common – “Cheta” (Brother). Okay, I don’t want to come out as a male chauvinist here. As the occasion called for, they did use “Chechi” as required too. But you could get by anywhere with those magical words. “Cheta, tea”, “Cheta, juice”, “Cheta, this” and “Cheta, that”. Ofcourse, next up in the words most understood by non-mallus came poda and patti but I’ll refrain from going into the details since this is not about the “Mallus”. Oh..by the way…there is a HUUUGE difference between “Cheetaa” and “Chetta”. (Ask that mallu friend again)

Tamil Nadu had the characteristic Anna as referenced before, which meant the same as Cheta – brother. And the utility of this word is pretty much the same there too – “Anna,tea”, “Anna, coffee”, “Anna university” and the likes.

I have not yet discovered what it is in Karnataka, but I have heard that you can get by with an interchangeable use of “Cheta”, “Anna” and the sorts. I shall not venture into the North since, as all below Mumbai are Madrasis, I am going to irrationally assume that it should be “Bhaiyya” everywhere (Foreigners, ask that Indian friend of yours. Yes yes..the mallu itself..he’ll know at least that much Hindi). One trend I DID notice ofcourse was that everyone was your brother: the rickshaw guy, bus conductor, even the guy younger than you who you need something from.

But then again, 1.5 years in A.P and I have learnt to use a new word. It could be due to the possibility of a majority wanting to badly dismember and swear at the person holding the actual title as referenced by this word but extensive use of it has ruined the title holder’s value. And not to mention the condescending manner in which it is uttered : “Boss”. There are variations to how it is said : “Booss”, “Booasss”, “Boohse”, “B-hose” etc etc.. Oh! This just in..apparently its catching up in Karnataka too. Well as long as I get the things I want done without having to walk over and poke the person or wave my hands crazily in front of him, I’m happy to call him anything. So I got no complaints. Besides, you know what they say " When in rome…

DISCLAIMER: This post was not intended to insult any region or faction of the society but if in ANY way you feel hurt or offended, Thankyou for reading.