All it takes is a disclaimer..

Before I get into the main story... a bit of background about how I landed up there. It started with the release of New Moon (the Twilight saga) and me listening to the OST of the movie and me again falling in love with the track “I belong to you…”by Muse.( Awesome song, listen it here: http://www.youtube.com/watchv=LMQuOkQyezU&feature=related) Like all other things I was impatient to share this song with my friends. So a week back, when I met them and we had hit the highway, it seemed like the perfect setting to unleash the greatness of the song to them, unfortunately I had already killed the battery of my motou9 (its not good on battery backup) by overenthusiastically listening to that Muse song about twenty times from the morning (and I am not exaggerating!)


So the next thing I did was remove the memory card of my cell and try to place it into my friend’s cell, one thing led to another and to cut a long story short, my memory card was stuck in her Nokia cell and for the week that followed and still is following I was left with my Motou9 minus the amazing songs and a FM radio..

Woof... that’s the background about how I landed up listening to FM in the first place!

So now, the three choices of FM I tuned into:

1. The all ad channel
2. The we are different channel
3. The promote us and get insulted channel.

And the reasons I was put off by each one of them

1. lots of ads with repetitive songs
2. Lots of ad about the fact that they don’t really repeat any song
3. Lousy, down-market language.

So now the sequence in which I got put off,

1. The promote us and get insulted channel: While it started with a disclaimer that they don’t intend to insult/hurt/ offend the sentiments of the said celebrities, whose voices they use to apparently promote their channel. I heard two such voices, but in spite of the disclaimer I was offended by the way the promo was aired. I mean it has some stupid loser going on and on about the acting talent of the said celebrity and the personal relationship etc etc. Point is, call me a bit held up but there’s a thin line between fun and vulgarity and from my perspective the said channel crossed it. Enough for me to move on…

2. The all ad channel: Now this is pure nostalgia, Eight years back when I had come to Pune, this channel was new. I remember that back then, radio culture was dead and this channel kinda revived it. I also remember that back in my PG accommodation, it was on all the time. It played some brilliant tracks and was a perfect mix of all the old bollywood melodies which I had forgotten so I got to listen to” Aisa na mujhe tum dekho..” and “Mujhe Pyaar tumse nahi hai nahi hai..” after many years on this channel alongwith the typical BoyZone, Backstreet Boys tracks and the Dil Se, Deewana tracks which were huge then. Now as I went back to it, it was just too much of ads and a long wait to listen to a song... maybe my timing was wrong.

3. The we are different channel: The longest I Was tuned in to is this. But the next time they say that they don’t repeat any song unlike other radio stations I am going to smash my FM... Seriously, Point taken, can we move on?

So that’s my experience on the radio scene these days, I am not a regular listener and still am waiting eagerly to get my memory card back so that I can go back to the repetitive songs of my play list. But the whole experience made me think about the competition in today’s world and the heights to which the media goes to claim the top slot. Also, what happened to the good old humor where the fun was not on somebody else’s expense but was subtle which left a smile on the face without having to insult someone? I may enjoy the Bakra on MTV but given a choice will watch “chupke chupke” happily for the 100th time.

Call me old fashioned, but I seriously will thank a said celebrity if he/she promotes my work rather than pass comments on their work, is it even humor? Apparently, all it takes is a disclaimer before we start assaulting someone in today’s world.

My fictional world

One of my all time favourite books, "Alice in Wonderland" and one of my favourite fictional chracters the Cheshire cat. I loved the madness and the grin. The cat is also famous for the logic and the conversations it has with Alice(http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Cheshire_Cat).
I personally like the "we all are mad here" quote. Its just a matter of perspective, is it not?
Another favourite character from the same author is Humpty Dumpty and his nonsensical talk with Alice in "through the looking glass". Especially when he remarks that, "When I choose to use a word, it means only what i choose it to mean, nothing more, nothing less." Kinda egotistical, but lovable.
Lewis Caroll made the two characters totally lovable and its silly but i like them better than Alice.
If i may say so, the cheshire cat is my idol and a fond remembrance to stay mad.
Whenever my sense of humor gets to the verge of exasperation I love to hear "you're mad" so that I can reply with "We all are mad here." I have a customised Tee ordered and to be delivered soon, which reads we all are mad here.
The characters are also a reminder to stay young at heart, in fact the book can cure one of any level of depression, trust me on this! I have a record of staying depressed for about 10/12.
Another era, another author, another genre. I am lately getting addicted to Nick Hornby. After watching "high fidelity" which i saw for John Cusack and "about a boy" which was for hugh grant, I finally discovered Hornby and he is one another person who makes one forget the woes of life. The words just flow like an conversation from his pen and i have finished all his fiction but i keep going back, especially to the opening paragraphs of High fidelity where the guy lists down his all time top five breakups. worth a read anytime!
Coming to the serious world, I had a serious crush on Howard Roark, he is too idealistic, but I love him for his ego and his belief in himself. and for the quotes, be it his conversation with his principal or the place where Toohey asks him what he thinks of him and  he replies with "But i dont think of you."  Then theres my favourite quote of the book, where he tells dominique to not get too attached to his work, I dont remember the exact words (and this write up is from memory so yeah am lazy and i refuse to pick the fountainhead up from the bedside even when right now am about an hand away from it) but Roark says something like" it effects me to a certain level, and then i feel nothing, and i am good till that something in me remains untouched. i cant feel too bad"(ok i ruined it). but i love the dialogue specially the something untouched part.

Next on the list has to be the "Wuthering Heights". I kinda struggled to finish it. The classics always put me to deep slumber but thats my new year resolution to finish off as many classics as i can which translates to a lot of sleep this year. Back to the heights, I loved the dark, deep, stormy connection between Catherine and Heathcliff. The quotes: When Heathcliff says that he wont have hurt Edgar though he hated him, but once Catherine's regard for Edgar ceased, he would have torn his heart and drunk his blood. grotesque!!

Blind Faith: though I hate the author (not because she is beautiful, sucessful and a published author, all the things that i aspire to be) but because she wrote blind faith which was good and she owes me 500 bucks coz i bought gin drinkers and its the most stupid book i ever read. but not blind faith. I loved it. It magnifies my fav character from Mahabharata "karna" but its not just tht, i was once compared to the main character in the book, indi, which made me read the book and i was an instant fan! she was the female Howard Roark. and definately not me.
This exhausts my list of fav fictional characters to whom i keep returning to, when reality gets too much to handle, the fictional world is the only escape.
Where are my sanity pills again??