Nai Roshni School

I’m absolutely chuffed that an old classmate, Samer Shahid, has his own band. His sounds are pretty cool. And damn, I still can’t get over the fact that he sings. Also, the lyrics are his.

This tells me everything I need to know about the absolute uselessness of conventional schooling. The one guy I thought would go on to win a Nobel or something ended up running his dad’s shops in Sharjah.

Anyway, here’s Samer and his band.

So it was boredom all along

Of course. And here I was, thinking most Arab drivers didn’t have a brain. In an otherwise neat story (Saudis race all night, fueled by boredom), an anthropologist tells the writer, “They are mostly young Bedouins who recently moved to the city, and whose lives are marked by suffering and self-destructive behavior”.

Erm, not exactly. I’ll tell ya what’s wrong with these gits. In Arab countries, driving is to a man what shopping is to a woman. You can’t do anything else. So the boredom bit is right. And self-destructive more or less nails it. Here’s how it panned out back in my time: in Dubai, the authorities had to ask people not to steer their car with their feet. Sit back and take it in. Their feet were on the wheel. On the wheel. On the highway. Where the upper limit of 120 kmph is a minor inconvenience. I get the heebie-jeebies just recalling the last time I saw an Arab leaning back with a coke in his hands, a leg on the dash and another on the wheel. He was in my rear view mirror, honking with his heel. Not boredom. Just empty.

Messing with music

Writers are picky about their copy. I wonder how Rahman feels when he hears a radio station theme tune added to the start of his songs.

Why honk when you can blind?

The Mumbai Police has this advice for drivers: Don’t honk. Using your dipper is more effective.

In theory, this is wonderful advice. Car behind flashes. Car ahead notices, and gently steers to the side.

Here’s how it actually works. Mumbai’s roads aren’t lit well, and the flash from behind resembles a Maglite in a dark room. Car refuses to move. I anticipate road rage and a few accidents before they scrap this useless suggestion.

Such wit

A commentator had a moment last night. It wasn’t of the usual variety, the ones that make you think, “Bring back Siva”, or “Chisty, all’s forgiven, so please come back”. India were seven down and the Pathans were batting. Just then, he sang in his sinister minister voice: “The Pathan brothers have the opportunity to do to Sri Lanka what Lehman Brothers did to the world.”

Oh, the nights he must have spent practicing that one. “Aha! That’s a good one,” he would have thought while combing his hair. “Tendulkar can do to Australia what Lehman Brothers did to the world,” he would have smirked in a strawberry bubble bath. “Sehwag can do to Harmison what Lehman Brothers did to the world,” he would have randomly thought while watching Triumph the Insult Dog in bed. “Gambhir can do to England what Lehman Brothers did to the world,” he would have told the bhajiwaala, who would have promptly told him, “Don’t you think that’s a little simplistic?” Shaken, he must have returned home and blankly stared at the bleak sea. “He’s right,” he would have thought. “Look at those ant-like people down there. They seem so happy from up here. They’re still walking. Some are even talking. Maybe I am being simplistic. Oh, who knows what all this is about. But it was such a good line.” The phone would have rung then, and he would have looked at his Nokia 8810. La Mo. The Mo.

“Hey, whass up?” Mo would have asked.

“Nothing much. I just found out my bhajiwaala knows more than me.”

“Man, fug dat shit. These guys work their networks. How else do you think they know so much?”

“But about Lehman Brothers? I feel so lost.”

“Look man,” Mo would have said, “It’s about respect. Who scored 10,000 runs? You did. Who was captain? You were. Who’s famous? You..”

“That was then, La Mo, that was then. Now I just come up with clever lines that make people laugh. I try so hard, so so hard, but it’s just not happening. It’s not coming out right. And it’s just that, you know, I wonder sometimes if we ex-cricketers make good commentators and…”

“Dude! Wait up! Time out, okay? Let’s not go there. Thass jus so self-destructive. SSUFFERIN SUCCOTASH! [covers the mouthpiece] Turn the damn thing off! [uncovers the mouthpiece] Gah. I hate Sylvester. Look. You guys are all so great. I grew up on you. You guys are my heroes. You, Ravi, Siva, Arun, Mani. Sanjay and Harsha could be too, but we’ll negotiate with them later.”

“Anyway. Forget me. Tell me about…”

“What? No! You can’t be like this. Look, what is this about? What got you started? The Lehman Brothers thing? Tell me.”

“I don’t know. It’s kind of embarrassing.”

“Oh come on. You’re just being modest. How typical.”

“Okay. Look. Do you have a minute?”

“Always.”

“Okay. Here goes. There’s this line I thought up, you know? And it says a lot. It’s current, and very relevant, and it’s a typical line, you know? It’s like, when people hear it, they know I’ve said it. And it’s like, when you remember it ten years later, you’re like, I said it. Not you, I.”

“Sure. That’s good. Hit me with it.”

“Okay. You ready? Here. Tendulkar can do to Australia what Lehman Brothers did to the world. It could be anyone there, you know, like Dravid, or, no, not Dravid…”

“Dravid?”

“I said it. Not Dravid. It could be Sehwag or Gambhir, or…”

“You know what? Stop right there. I like it.”

“You do? The bhaji guy thought it was too simple.”

“Forget him. Who runs cricket here? Me. Who runs world cricket? Me. Who has a spiral staircase? Me. And I think it’s relevant. Like you said. And thoughtful. It shows you’re thinking about the world and you’re clued in on the crisis. It’s nice and subtle. We could work it into a highlights package later. I’ll talk to Tha Fanny about it. Oh wait. This is Sri Lanka, right? I think he’s got the rights… Or does he? Anyway, I’ll talk to whoever… oh, wait, yeah, now I remember. He does. Just bought them last a week before the first game. But look, I like the line. I think it’s a shot at greatness for you. One line could do it for you. And everybody’s thinking about Lehman. Everyone.”

“But timing’s everything, right?”

“Oh, absolutely. Can’t do it too early, can’t leave it too late. Try the fifth game.”

“Should I wait to see how it goes? If India win four in a row, then it’s no fun.”

“Do you want to try the T20 game? It might work there. The audience is totally in, you know? And I have a feeling it’ll help us expand the market if they know we’re thinking about Lehman.”

“Hmm. You could be right. So I’ll wait. Thanks bro.”

“Anytime. Remember: just practice. Work on it day and night, every waking moment, so it’s in you churning and turning and squiggly in your brain when you’re sleeping, and you can say it backwards if I ask. You gotta want it bad.”

“I’ll do it, Mo, I’ll do it. For you, for me, and for the highlights package.”

This will be my last post on cricket for a while. Last night a commentator did to me what Lehman Brothers did to the world. Needless to say, I’m pretty certain this conversation never really took place, and that the commentator has absolutely no self-esteem issues. None whatsoever. Zilch.

Dev.D after a good night’s sleep

Yep. It passes the morning-after test.

Dev.D

What. A. Movie. The man’s a genius. I mean, the things he made Dev do. The gorgeous vignettes. Chandramukhi and a mobile phone. His take on Chunilal. A surprising and strange dance that came from nowhere, and yet fit beautifully with Dev’s descent. It was insane. At first it felt like he was taking the mickey out of every Punjabi shaadi movie ever made, and with dialogue that was alive and rooted in villages and the city. And then, then he just took it somewhere else, somewhere gorgeous, toying with my expectations of Devdas at the end. Would it be too premature to say that this is the finest movie he has made, and that it’s right up there with the finest cinema I’ll ever see? Yep, I’m pretty certain I’ll feel this way after a good night’s sleep.

On finishing Akira

I feel like Trinity in the third Matrix movie. Sunlight for a second, and back to hell. Sigh.

The Grey Lady has our measure

The music blog on NYT, Measure For Measure, is an outstanding place to be. I spent yesterday listening to Andrew Bird, one of the blog’s contributors, who is described as a singer, songwriter, guitarist, violinist, and whistler. The last one had me. Anyway, do check out Andrew’s music here. I’m amazed at the no-fuss layout and how easy it is to access music. No hiccups, no downloads, just one click. The ‘Barn Tapes’ sample is gorgeous in a mind-warping way, while ‘Oh No’ is kind of, well, in a word, chirpy. I prefer the first version to the final. And if you like him enough, you might even decide to hear his upcoming album, ‘Noble Beast’ (available if you know where to look). When you do, listen to the first fifty seconds of ‘Effigy’; if my life had a soundtrack, these fifty seconds would be my favourite bit.

Unread books, silent guitar

There are shelves of unread books. There’s a Spanish guitar in the corner that needs some loving. There are piles of notebooks empty apart from the first page. There’s a box of vocabulary cards I keep meaning to read. A city out there has my name on it, and no, it’s not Dubai. There are Kurosawa dvds I’ve never seen. Ingmar Bergman too. I haven’t covered a war yet. Two months will pass before Sibelius is completely downloaded; then I can write music with the guide a musician let me borrow. I never paid attention in Arabic class. The song, the song, the song. The perfect retort.