ENDHIRAN : 30’s Inspiration, 60’s Perspiration

Fresh out of the movie hall at 2.30 AM ( yes it A M and not P M) from the midnight show of Endhiran, I have various thoughts that cross my mind. I am not a Tamilian, nor do I stay in Chennai .I left Chennai 2 years back and now I stay , 3500 miles away, in a tiny island called Bahrain. Driving back from the movie , I was wondering why was I excited to the point of lunacy to see this movie “ Endhiran – The Robot”? Was it the hype created that it is financially, the biggest movie ever made In Indian cinema ? Was it my Tamil friends who have been raving about it for the past one year ? Was it Aishwarya Rai, who is arguably the most beautiful woman in the world ( at 37, yes she is, at 31 its my wife without an argument) ? Or was it the One and Only SUPER STAR RAJNI?

Anyone who has stayed in Tamilnadu for a significant part of their cognizant life would understand what I am writing, but this blog is for all those non Tamil friends of mine who do not know and understand the Rajni film cult. Innocent and unaware of this cult I first landed in Chennai in the summer of 2001. Experiencing Chennai summer is equivalent to being in a pressure cooker on a simmering flame. My introduction to the “Aura of Rajnikanth” happened on a hot Sunday afternoon when I had to go to the ATM about a mile away. I was staying in a mansion in Triplicane ( “Bachelors’s Paradise” as it is apparently called) and walked down to the main road to hire a auto. I dint find a single auto on the road. I walked down to the nearest auto stand only to find all the autodrivers glued to a 14” Philips TV at the tea stall. I requested ( yes , in Chennai you request ) an autodriver in my alienated tinglish/tamlish and his refusal slapped me in the face. Requested another with the same result. No one was ready to move because Rajni’s blockbuster “BASHA” was playing on TV that afternoon. On my way, to and from, the ATM I decided that I got to see the movie that had put me through this arduous summer stroll. And believe me, I could not comprehend the fact that someone could uproot a handpump and electric pole with your bare hands to fight people and therefore I was literally rolling on the floor , laughing my guts out when I first saw it. You dare do this in Tamilnadu even after reading my blog, I must tell you ladies and gentlemen that it can cause you some scary “Dial your Ambulance” situations.

I left Chennai after a few months to Ahmadabad, but somewhere in me a Rajni fan was silently taking shape. I continued to follow Rajni through “ Baba” , “Padiyappa” and other movies and landed in Chennai for a second stint when “Chandramukhi” was released. This time it was a longer stint and I think I needed it. I needed it to fully understand the emotions that one man can stir in the hearts of millions of people, young and the old, male and female, labourer and a VP and all this across the world .

Rajnikanth’s, Thalaivar as he is called, movie release is like a festival in Tamilnadu. People mark the date on the calendar at home, in office, at the local tea stalls and restaurants. If the directors could announce the movie release dates a year in advance and stuck to it, most calendar printers and companies would not binge from including it in the list of events for the year. Albert hall in Chennai is decorated like a bride and all other movie halls sport a festive look. Tamilians in the US, UK, Middle East, Singapore and Japan keep a tab on the release date. Lines for the ticket could be as long as the darshan lines for Lord Balaji in Tirupati. Afterall, this man is no less than a GOD. The shows start at midnight and continue for 24 hrs and this invariably is the scene across the innumerable movie halls, big or small across the state. And his fans live this culture whether they are in Tamilnadu or otherwise.

What keeps this man going relentlessly, giving one block buster after another, at the age of 60 and what makes his fans stick with adamancy is a question that you may try and answer when you first see his movies, but you will give up that thought and be a part of this Rajni madness from the third and fourth movie. That’s what happened to me and that’s what happens to millions of fans.

Rajnikanth signifies a unifying force. His movies draw people to theatres from all social classes and castes . It’s like a small scale national integration across states, countries and continents .For an actor to do this, and consistently for the past 30 years , he’s got to be super human. His movie releases generate an euphoria that engulf and eventually absorb people from other states living in Tamilnadu and I can vouch on behalf all my Kulkarni, Gupta, Sinha & Kamble friends that it is our voluntary submission to his Aura.

Consturction labour in the place I stay probably earn about Rs 8000-10000 per month, but I was overwhelmed by the power of Rajni when I saw labour hailing from Chennai spending Rs 500 to see his movie in the costliest mall in Bahrain yesterday. That’s 5% of their monthly income and that’s probably worth 2 months of their rations at this place. And what does Rajni give them – Infinite ROI, a reason to smile and be united as a community for that one day, it does not matter whether you are a Iyer, Iynegar, Christian or a muslim, it does not matter whether you are a labourer, manager, VP or a CEO. Rajni binds them all on one single platform. And if you thought that these poor laborers would be cursed by their families for spending 500 bucks on Rajinikanth movie in a hand to mouth situation, you would be mistaken, because back home the scene with their children and wife would be no different. They would be watching the matinee show.

When you sit back and think, how many of these people actually understand what ROBOT means, what is a terra hertz, whats a Giga byte, what is an android, what is a humanoid? But does that really matter? They just want to see Rajini. For that three hours yesterday, I did not feel for a minute that I was in a foreign land.I experienced the same excitement from the crowd when they see Rajni appearing on the screens in chennai, when he takes the form of a robot and every powerful dialogue that he delivers with unparalleled aplomb and panache. For those three hours you transform into a child, give up your worries, thoughts and just sink into the magic.

I don’t understand Tamil much and especially not the one that’s spoken in the movies, but I understand every bit of Rajni’s movie. Apart from his powerful dialogue delivery, he communicates with his mannerisms and actions. This is the reason he is a rage also in countries where people do not understand the language. I would go a step further and say that if you had a group of hearing impaired people to see this movie, they would still understand his movie just like we all do. Rajni truly transcends geographical and physical barriers. The energy in the swing of his hands, his dance etc has not faded in the last 30 years and with every movie in the recent past he only seems to challenge his reflexes. If you don’t belive me , see Endhiran and go home and watch an old Rajni movie and spot the difference. I bet you will not be able to. This is what my dad said when he came out of the movie hall “ Phew! This guy did this movie at 60?”. My dad is 60.

In Mumbai , you have Khan’s, Bachans, Kapoors, Johars and many more but in TN its only Rajni, RAJNIKANTH. If you were to compare him to any other contemporary hero, Tendulkar is the probably the only one who can match his innings. It is probably very difficult to say if Tendulkar is playing Rajni’s innings or Rajni is playing Tendulkar’s. People might argue that Rajni is a reel hero and Sachin a real hero, but for me any man who can bring millions of people to a standstill and pray to the almighty for his continued success, is a True Hero. It does not matter whether it is real or Reel. And RAJNI is a Hero.

To all my friends in 30’s who have written reviews about Endhiran saying that its not a typical Rajni entry , the first half isn’t as good as the second half, My dad suggests you read this blog when you are 60 , try doing what Rajni is doing today and reflect on the past 30 years of your life. I am sure you would want to revisit your reviews.

Rajni is an Inspiration to people of our age. He is THE BASHA, BABA, PADIYAPPA, BOSS and the one and only ENDHIRAN that you will witness in the years to come. DOT.

Dear Suiciders at Leaning Tower of Pisa,

My Wife and I have planned to celebrate our 5th wedding anniversary in Italy this year. Tickets and hotels have been booked and we are raring to live the dream of seeing Rome, a city whose history has enamored mankind for centuries. Some people say one life is not enough to see Rome, but since we don’t have a lifetime and need to earn and save up to go on another holiday, we decided to spend 8 days in Italy. 3 days in Rome, 3 days in Florence and 2 in Venice. Any tourist guide in the world would recommend these 3 places as “must see” on Italian Itinerary.

So sprits up and counting days, I open the morning news paper to find some wonderful news: “Woman jumps to death from Leaning Tower of Pisa”. You can now understand how frustrated one can be after reading a headline like this. For a second, I was wondering whether I should be thanking my stars that I dint get to see a horrendous incident during my visit or curse her stars for pushing her to death before my visit. Nevertheless, letting bygones be bygone I sit back and wonder why someone would jump from the leaning tower of Pisa? It is incomprehensible, but let’s try and understand from the perspective of a frustrated prospective tourist who has 4000 Euros at stake.

There could be several reasons why this lady committed suicide. Following are the findings from my analytical paralysis.

Ø On a more benevolent note, she could be a visitor who was unhappy that the tower was leaning way beyond what Miss Suicide could take and she could not see it tilt anymore, so decided to kill herself. Ridiculous isn’t it? Possible! I would have asked her to leave a note to people pleading them to bury her below the tower so that she can stop the tilt.

Ø She, probably; felt that leaning tower of Pisa was planning to kill her by falling on her. An extreme case of hypochondria. Silly? Possible! You never know.

Ø Or she could be a dissatisfied employee of the Tourism board. She decided to teach her bosses a lesson by ending her life at the tower so that the Tourism Euros are affected and all her colleagues would be depressed for not receiving salaries on time and commit suicide. Great thought. Credits to her for assuming that her suicide could spark off an Italian suicide revolution. I wish she was in the Nazi camp or was Hitler’s Girlfriend. He would have shot himself atleast a decade earlier than he actually did and we would have never had the chapter “World war II” in our history books.

Ø Or she felt that the tower needed some maintenance. She probably dint know how to speak Italian and thought she could communicate the message through her suicide. The tower went on maintenance after the last suicide in 2002. Miss Suicide would have been an absolute failure at “data sufficiency” and “logical reasoning” tests in GMAT or GRE. She has no idea how to link up events. Fact is, the tower did not go on maintenance because of the suicide.

Ø Or, last but not the least, she probably knew that I was planning my trip to Italy and Leaning tower Pisa was on my Itinerary. Now that makes me feel better because someone thinks that I am important enough to be prevented from visiting the Leaning Tower of Pisa, else she would have jumped from Mole Antonelliana ( 167 mts high). But does this building have staircase to the top floor. Got to Google. For all you know Miss Suicide would have researched some buildings before she pinned on Tower of Pisa.

Nevertheless, it is an earnest appeal to all people planning to kill themselves at Pisa, Please do not do it during the months of June, July and August. We know you are no good and are a burden on the planet, we completely understand your emotions, but please allow the tourists from across the world to enjoy Italy and postpone your suicide plans until the winters.

Plight of Tatkal passport applicants in the Tatkal govt

I am an avid follower of Shashi Tharoor on twitter. I respect that man for candid revelations of inner world of Indian political bureaucracy. I was infact very happy to know that few days ago he had a meeting with all the officials of the southern regional passport offices to figure out ways and means of serving the public better.

Well, I thought it would be helpful to apprise Shashi on the current simple processes at our regional passport offices that are thoroughly mismanaged before we plan and implement better ways of helping public. It is a sad state of affairs at the Hyderabad regional passport office. My brother, about to leave to the UK on a business trip, applied for a duplicate passport as the lamination on the last page of his old passport was damaged. He applied under the 7 day tatkal quota, that cost him Rs 5000/-. Well there is also 15 days tatkal quota for Rs 2500/- .Having applied on the 24^th of July, my brother was expecting the passport by the 31^st of July. On the 29^th of July the website was updated saying “police verification pending”. There is no police verification required for a tatkal passport where the address on the passport matches the current permanent address. So we begin the long journey of calling the unresponsive passport office enquiry number. In 3 hours we make about a 50 attempts before we get thru to some customer service madam in the office. And mind you, you dare not show your temper to these guys even if you were trying to get them online for 6 hrs. In a meek and respectful tone my dad asks him about the status of the passport and if there was any mistake in updating the online status. The voice on the other side said that the status updated was perfect since this is a normal passport application. With a broad smile on his face my dad replied that it was a tatkal application. The reply from the otherside was the most hilarious I have ever heard “ Ayyo, saar, we dint know till the time you told us, we thought it was a normal application form”. Blindfolded dumbos did not flip the page while processing to see if it was a normal application or a tatkal! They end the call saying that they will process the application immediately and the passport will be posted in 2 days. Another candid request from them was not to trust the updates on the website because the servers are down for the past few days. Perfect example of IT implementation in a govt setup. It’s like handing AK 47 to a toy gunner. Anyways, with a sigh of relief, we drop the phone and decide to wait for the next 2 days. On the 2^nd of August we call up to find out that the application has been processed and the new passport number has been generated. On the 5^th we find out that the application has not been processed. And all this information is from the same lady who answered the calls on the 31^st, 2^nd and the 5^th.

We finally decided to go to the passport office. The scene at the office is chaos. People standing in line for hours together to enquire about the status of the passport. After 4 hours of waiting, the only P.R.O ( I think it is the Public Reprimanding Officer) obliges to give us the status of the passport. “ Saar your passport is done. Here is the new number. You will get it in 2 days” . On 10^th, we go again with a hope that we will get to meet the Passport officer, but in vain. On 11^th again, again on 12^th, and also on the 13^th of august. We don’t get to see the LORD. Probably we dint offer the right ablutions to see him. Infact there were other disciples offering ablutions to the office boys and other babus at the desks to get their passports done. On enquiring with one such applicant, we found that he was a veteran at this office. He applied for a 7 day tatkal passport 2 months ago and never received it. Since then he has bribed so much that he could have got a return ticket to Srilanka, but sadly he never got the passport. Same was the story with many others. People suggested that we adopt the same route so that atleast the turn around time is reduced to 2 month which otherwise might end up to be 3-4 months. Now we are wondering if we should adopt the Indian way of getting things done – Jugaad ? paisa? What else do the Lords accept? Any suggestions Mr Tharoor?