உலக நாயகன்

 "The Man from Earth" - This movie will go down in my all time favorites. The whole 87 minutes is just one location where a group of people confess, critic, cross-question and cheer about a central theme. The intellectual discussions gave me multiple highs like very few movies did to me. 

A story is narrated, the listeners throw questions - what? when? where? who? how? etc. Everything gets answered - mind you - not necessarily the answer you wanted / liked to hear. The core question of why? is not convincing for the audience, and that makes their disbelief stronger.  

The philosophies are tied into intricately. Man does not die for 14,000 years - who would want to hear his never-ending story? Of course, "bring us only the high-points" asks the mundane and pre-programmed audience. In a way its good, again, who will listen to a long, never-ending story?

You know only as much as your race would know that point of time. You either learn from your best lot of the species or teach / preach them when you have known the most. But every memory need not stay - perception of time, knowledge of languages, origin of religions, concept of love - every human aspect is explored in conversations. These conversations are rich and thought-provoking.

High degrees in Anthropology, Biology, Art, Archaelogy, History are baffled by the revelation - simply because you know, rather you trust only as much as your text knowledge. When anchor of belief is shaken, one cannot accept it instantly. But the truth of differentiating knowledge and faith is an eye-opener. How can we suddenly trust endless possibilties? 

Oh my God! (quips), endless possibilities? Horizons are infinite for real. Those biblical references and the puns! "Why did you have to cave to Gruber?", the names like Oldman, Young, etc.

Life comes a full circle for eveyone, except this man - which goes in a painstakingly long forward looking line. The film teased the hell out of my curious brain. Being blamed for taking life forces, accused guilty of outliving your loved ones, one time the vampire, another time the messiah, purpose of life and what not? 

That fake flashback attempt was full on satirical - did I not say we want to hear what we like to hear? Every story has to come to an end. Does it really? We just take whatever closure out of it and move on. The protoganist too, moves on and on. The man who has lived the most talks from his experience and all we witness is the core getting lost in Translation & Perception. 

How does one's time come to an end? By physical non-existence or by being forgotten? 

"சாகாவரம் போல் சோகம் உண்டோ? தீரா கதையை கேட்பார் உண்டோ?" 

We never know the person in front of us really well, do we? Their story, history and nature. As long as we are here, for the time that we are, being kind (to others, to beings, to nature, to oneself) can make the earth engine revolve a few more times with life aboard, for more stories to continue and happen....,

மதுரை வீரன் தானே!

Another draft resurrected from April 2021. 

It was a difficult time - Appa had been admitted into hospital. But something made me write about Madurai Muthu. Of all why would I choose to write about this man, one would think. 

He is known to many of us 90s kids and elders, who is a regular viewer of Kalakkapovadhu Yaru in Vijay TV. First of its kind TV show with a determined purpose to make people laugh. The show had an array of men (KPY Nisha et al entered much later in the franchise) performing skit / parody / spoof / mimicry / slapstick / mockery to showcase their talents, each excelling in their own forte. But this man, preferred the long-standing technique of standup comedy. The traditional stand-up where he stands in front of a mic and tells joke after joke after joke.

Dry, you may think. But unlike memorizing some monologue and performing, this is much different. It needs planning - prepare the jokes, rehearse it with good audience, perform in front of people, dynamically change the order based on audience reaction, infuse one or two own tracks and most of all - keep the options open. The branching-off technique can enable you to choose one particular topic and go endless with many plan B's. For eg, you start a train joke, get a good response, suddenly branch off saying - "Ipdithan parunga, innoru naal, vera oru train la,....." and it goes on and on.

This type could be my favourite, and hence I am vouching for Muthu. But the real reason why it became my favourite is my Appa. He has this knack of traditional 'stand-up' comedy. I must say, man has got talent. His timing is impeccable. You give him a stage and time, he's up for the challenge anytime without hesitation. To be honest - the audience can be one or many, He can crack as many jokes as possible, that too flavoured with light Nellai accent. There were instances in my school and family functions where he had to temporarily take up the stage because the original chief guest cancelled last minute. Towards the end of his act, he gives a thought-provoking question or statement which has a feel-good factor. Now you know why Madurai Muthu is my favourite.

Appa is my idol in humor sense and humor science. All my childhood, my interest was getting shaped to enjoy and appreciate good humor, and create good humor. Any tense situation can be made laughable. All I'm saying is some people got it natural, some try to acquire. Whichever the way, as long as you can have a good laugh, medically it is good. Life becomes simpler and even when everything goes wrong, you have the satisfaction of one good laugh.

After a long gap, I was happy to watch Muthu enter as a judge in last KPY season. And that continued when he came in as a contestant / special guest / repeat cameos in the Cook With Comali Season 2. Throughout his journey in CWC 2, amidst all controversies, I was happy to see him fire jokes with whatever limited time and challenging/overpowering newcomers he had. He innovated himself - 'thunukku jokes' Muthu transformed into doing property comedy, body language reactions and what not. It was not his forte, lets be honest. But a creative comedian always has the right spirits. Age difference, experience, sabotaging the comedy, counters and not giving a chance - nothing deterred him. He was unstoppable till the finals. The way Simbu enjoyed the Mambalam joke and the Egmore joke like a kid, is a true testimony.

The way he handled Shivangi's timing counter, and also talked maturely about it in the interviews shows his value. A childhood icon remaining one's true icon even after you grow up, without any controversy, all a fan(boy) could ask for. Amidst all other differences of thoughts with his recent speeches and commentaries, for me - Muthu will continue to be an icon in the comedy business. Appa too!

After all, மதுரை வீரன் தானே!!!

Kingdom of the Sky

Disclaimer: This post was started in 2013 but being the lazy ass that I am, took more than a decade to complete. The gestation period might have spoiled the narrative and things went missing, so kindly excuse if you don't get the practical info that you might be looking for in a travelogue.  

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It all started as one more holiday trip planner. This time we had days at our disposal and bunking classes for 1-2 days in addition will put us in an excellent spot - travel-wise. So, there were easily 5 days in our hands, enabling us to venture for a longer trip. Darjeeling (I guessed), will be the best choice. Some nominated for Gangtok. And atlast came the most weird choice, out of the blue - Bhutan! We realised that it was a serious choice put up by Abhinav and sooner we found ourselves planning for it. After many discussions, budget estimates, unexpected twists and almost cancellation, the trip was on, with only 3 of us onboard.
 
The trio - Abhinav, Ashwin and I, started on Jan 31, 2013. After nearly 16 hours of train and 5 hours of bus, including rooftop journey (remember Ela machi machi song?), we were at the Indo-Bhutan frontier town - Jaigaon. Unfortunately, we were late by an hour, so we had to wait one more night to get into Bhutan legally. We spent the night in a hotel room and through local advice, we got the information that the Bhutan Immigration office will open by 9AM. There we were, standing in our hotel balcony, trying to look beyond the gates of the foreign country, trying hard to decipher what lays yonder through the darkness. But the tiredness of travel took the better of us and sooner we dozed off, trying to release all the strain we picked up from 24+ hours of travel. 

Morning we entered the gates. Crossing the border by foot in this modern world where people fly and sail to foreign lands, this was a different feeling. We reached the office only to find that we had wasted 30 minutes inspite of our watches showing 9AM. Understand that time is a precious investment during unplanned journeys. The maximum you save, it will help you in the future. Later, Ashwin brilliantly solved the enigma - we were in a different country, following a different time zone. Theirs was 30 mins ahead of us. We got time-zoned! 

The immigration procedure ended in just 15 mins and we were legally termed as 'foreign tourists'. There was one peculiar thing I noted in the immigration office and I confirmed it while negotiating with taxi drivers for hiring a taxi to Paro - All of them speak good English and even Hindi. 

We had some random breakfast in a Phuentsholing (bam! I spelled it right after all these years in the first try) joint. Best way to reach Paro was to get hitchhiked with locals who had come down to the plains for some work and are returning with spare seats. We made a good deal, the SUV was so good. Considering it was drive in the hill roads, the driving felt so rash. I force-slept to avoid the sickness and woke up after couple of hours. There we were, passing through random hills, clouds, rivers and everything looked so alien. That untold fear that you are in a new territory where things are not in your control creeped in. The only soothing thing for the mind was the song playing on the stereo - "Udayo Relaile", later I figured it was a Nepali song - still in my playlist. We learnt that India had a major role for laying and maintaing the roads, providing security and necessary goods, fuel to the country.

Paro was so cold when we alighted. The town looked so deserted and not a single soul moved around. We checked-in and Abhinav drilled us to get ready in no time. We went to nearby temples, while returning things did not go well with our taxi driver and he deserted us at a random spot. That creepy fears only got intensified. We walked back and retired in the home-stay.

Next day itinerary was Takstang or the Tiger's nest monastery. No taxis on the road - first Sundays were green and no vehicles inside town limit. We found a taxi guy outside the town limit, convinced him to store our luggages till the time we came down from the cliff. Abhinav was a man of determination, he helped Ashwin climb up too. I had no choice - it was my first ever trekking experience. The ~4 hours enroute the summit included lot of self-pity, unuttered curses on Abhinav, pitstops and loud, unpleasant breathing. But looking back, that IS one of a kind experience for me. Describing that in words is so tough - you go, you experience it!

Takstang made the trip look much better - we proceeded to Thimphu the same evening. Slept like a log. Last day we went straight to bus station - booked our return tickets for the evening. Then we found English - our cheerful taxi driver-cum-tour guide for the day. Trust me if you found a guy like English - all your trips are sorted. He introduced us to Ema Datshi - a tasty local soup. We toured the zoo, radio station, the Dzongs, National Post Office, Buddha Dodernma (Bhuddha Point) and finally saw the palace from a view-point. Thimphu had a lot of decorative, colorful phalluses in their houses and streets. They believe it brings good luck and wards off evil spirits.

We made friends with English on Facebook - Tshering Dorji (the story feels truly old now, do people use Fb still?) and bid good-bye. The bus journey was a decent travel - there was another stereo, another global song, surprisingly - "Why this Kolveri di?" 

We came back safe and sound in one piece, after all the errors and experiments. When I was back in the KGP campus, I read more and was blown about GNH (Gross National Happiness) and Carbon Neutrality. Watch the video where their then PM talks about Carbon Negativity and that will inspire us in many ways.

The saddest part of the trip was we don't have any stamps in our passports. A small, land-locked country nestled in the Himalayas never to be discounted for, as it had all the beauty, pristine nature as strongholds. I always keep thinking - will I be able to make the climb up in Takstang or proceed to Bumthang & Dochu La if I ever get to go again. The breathtaking landscapes will forever linger in my heart.