A 5000 word fun post

Humour

But remember, the fun lies in your imagination.

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Lavatory, observatory, dormatory (dormitory)? Tiger Den Govt. Guest House, Sariska

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My looo or My 1000? (The number 2 is a coincidence, right?) A shop in Shenzhen, China.

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No comments from me! The fun lies entirely in your imagination :-) A shop in Shenzhen, China
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(1) No butts on the beach? Isn’t that anti-dress code?
(2) The graphic seems to suggest that fish should not smoke!! Signboard at Pattaya beach, Thailand

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Appetite killer — this just when you are about to place your order! The Fifth, Food Avenue, MBK, Bangkok

p.s.
And the 5000 words promised in the post title? Don’t you know how many words a picture is worth!

Spiderman-3 Review: Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Spyde(rman)

Media & Entertainment

Just watched Spiderman-3 in a ‘paid preview’ show at the Sahara Mall PVR in Gurgaon. There is something fundamentally ‘deflating’ about a ‘paid preview’. Now contrast this with Spiderman (1) which I had seen in a ‘real’ Thursday premiere show in Mumbai! (And where I got my 15 seconds of prime time presence on Star News — my sound bites being sandwiched between celebrity-speak and vox populi.)

A quick round up.
Plus points?
Extraordinary action and thrills — living up to the Spiderman 1 & 2 standards.

Minus points?
I had like a 100 deja vu moments. Read on… (Spoiler alert!)

Spiderman gets a split-personality. Dr. Jekyl (with the famous red and blue Spiderman vardi) and Mr. Spyde (who in black spandex is un-vardi. Oops I mean unworthy!)

The villain — actually one of the villains — a special-effects marvel, is of triple parentage. Wait that’s not part of the plot. What I mean is that he has the looks of The Hulk, physical composition of The Mummy and the size of Godzilla!

A bit of Abhimaan thrown in. Professional jealousy leading to (pre)marital discord. She resents his popularity.

She even resents him publicly kissing the ‘other girl’. She says, “How could you? That was OUR kiss.” That “OUR kiss” of course referring to the famous scene from the first movie where Spiderman hangs upside down while she pulls his mask down to do the needful. So it is not only in India that a public kiss (peck, whatever) between Richard Gere and Shilpa Shetty causes so much unrest! But notice that in America the emphasis is on getting the priorities right. Pull the mask sufficiently — to only expose the lips. Why bother with frivolities like look into the eyes and all that jazz(baat).

The American onlookers reaction to anyone who’s perched on some high-up spot (which happens a lot in Spiderman) reminded me of the “arrey bhai yeh suicide kya hota hai?” “jab angrez log martey hain toh usko suicide kehte hain” from Sholay when Dharmendra climbs onto the water tank!

A bit of Raj Kapoor’s Sangam — friends in love with the same girl. A bit of Qurbani (and 20,000 other movies) — one of the friends interrupting with his own torso, the trajectory of a projectile (bullet, knife, blades, poles etc.) aimed at the other friend! And as a befitting finale, dying in the lap of his friends after a refusing-to-let-go-off-footage-crunching dying speech!

A Ramu kaka benevolent equivalent who knows some khaandaan ka raaz that sorts out some misunderstanding. Ramu kaka, if only you had opened your mouth earlier — Spiderman-2 needn’t have been made!

One of the characters loses his memory and then regains it later — both transactions (losing and regaining) contributing to the plot! Vintage Hindi cinema, right?

A perennially angry man’s anger management routine being the cause for some comic moments. Munabhai MBBS anyone? A little bit of Lage Raho Munnabhai — with villains saying “apun ko tereko sorry bolne ka hai“! (I am not quoting, just capturing the sentiment!)

There’s a scene completely lifted from Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge (DDLJ). Remember the song ‘Ruk ja…‘? Here Shah Rukh is played by Spider Khan, oops, Spiderman. There we had a Simran — Kajol. Here we have a simmerin’ Kirsten Dunst. (Simmerin’, Simran sounds similar, right?) The song and dance begins with the hero unexpectedly displaying his nimble finger work on the piano keys. And the rest of the dance is to annoy/rile the heroine. I won’t be surprised if Farah Khan has actually ghost-choreographed this song! Actually I would be surprised. Else either Farah’s PR, or the Indian media (not much separating the two, right?) would have left no stone unturned in shoving this news down our throats! Remember how they went berserk after her Shakira tryst?

Again DDLJ — remember SRK talking to Simran’s mom in a simranizing tone, oops, sermonizing tone? “Meri maa ne mujhe sikhaaya thha. Zindagi mein do raste chun sakte ho. Ek aasaan. Ek mushkil. Blah. Blah” That is the gyaan from this movie too — we are what we choose to be!

I left the movie with a heavy sense of DDLJ vu!

Humour by templates – 2 :: Women’s age, men’s salary

Humour

We were told, etiquette demands that you never ask a woman her age nor ask a man his salary. An offshoot of this are the numerous jokes about women hiding their age. Of course today it is no longer taboo for women to not-hide their age. So ladies and gentlemen, presenting…

Humour template – 2 :: Women’s age, men’s salary

Whenever a woman tells you her age, ask, if you are in return expected to disclose your salary.

Note: This is only for men. However women could improvize and do the corollary.

Scenario:

She: “…blah, blah… and now they tell me this when I am 30…”
You: “Should I tell you the CTC or take-home?”
She: “What??”
You: “I’ll have to tell you my salary, right? Now that you just told me your age.”

This works better when there are other people present. In which case you could modify it slightly and involve another man to hedge the joke. Additional advantage: Greater the number of people, higher the chances of at least some of them getting the joke in the first place!

Scenario :

She: “…blah, blah… and now they tell me this when I am 30…”
You: “Jammy, you will now have to tell her your salary!”
Jammy: “Why??”
You: “She just told you her age!”

(Needless to say, this scenario assumes you are not Jammy!)

Travelling to China – (2): Chinese pandas in Hong Kong

Humour, Travel

Last month when I was in Shenzhen China I happened to pick up the South China Morning Post (published out of Hong Kong). This was part of my efforts at being a conscientious visitor who tries to get a feel of the country to reel-off authentic first-hand gyaan about an alien place/culture/ to people back home!

Guess what caught my eye…

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…This ‘moving’ story, literally…

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…About these two pandas, that China gifted to Hong Kong!

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And the names of these dramatis personae?

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…No. 606 and No. 610!

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So what happens in a society where almost all of people’s needs as per Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs are already met?

They call for a public consultation to name these pandas!

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And since this seems the most pressing issue, topical humour around this is only to be expected… (click picture to enlarge)

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:-)

Humour by templates – 1 :: Wrong name repartee

Humour

Obviously the immediate stimuli for this post has been the enormous expectation thrust upon me by being listed in the humour category of this compilation of top Indian blogs!

It was my friend Niyam, who had once (circa 2003-4) suggested that I come out with a humour D.I.Y (do it yourself) paper. As much as I liked the idea, there was no time in life to do it.

Then I met Jammy at work (circa 2005). Jammy was unabashed about his aspiration to be a stand-up comedian. We got along very well, as we would keep cracking jokes given the slightest of opportunities. And then (here is the scoop) Jammy would go home and neatly package some of those jokes into original posts that one saw on ouchmytoe! (Sadly he had like a 100 other sources like me, so I could never sue him for copyright infringement.)

And then the other day Jammy wrote this “How to create your own jokes” post and it occurred to me, that the time had come to start building on the humour D.I.Y paper that Niyam had suggested — lest Jammy beat me to the patents office on this!!

So here goes…

Humour template – 1 :: Wrong name repartee

You would have faced situations where the person talking to you addressed you by a wrong name. I have faced this a lot. The most common being, called Rohit. I guess the two names seem smilar or have similar associations to many people. The other common mis-attribution is when people have called me Vivek or Karan. I know that’s because there have been semi-famous individuals called Vivek Razdan (cricketer) and Karan Razdan (TV actor and director). So people remember the surname Razdan and forget the name Rahul and then from their mental associations they end up dishing out Karan or Vivek! In fact my thesis guide (during my B.Arch days at School of Planning and Architecture, Delhi) kept on calling me Karan for most of the semester, and I was doing fairly well grade-wise. And then one day, when I had to tell him that my name was Rahul and not Karan, my grades started falling! (Sure, there could be other reasons too for that!)

Coming back to the template…

So when someone calls you by a name other than yours, make sure in your reply to address the other person by name. Only, someone else’s!

Scenario:

Ajay (addressing me): “Rohit, I appreciate your work, but I had expected better.”
Me: “See Ajit, I admit I could have done better. But…”
Ajay: “Who’s Ajit???”
Me: “Who’s Rohit??”
Ajay: “Oops, I am sorry! That was smart.”
Me (with a smug expression): “hehe…”
Ajay (already having lost a psychological battle): “On second thoughts, your work isn’t that bad either.”

This needs a little practice, but works like a charm!

Extra impact is assured when the substitute name you use is of a person who this person doesn’t like!

There is something self-esteem-battering about someone not remembering your name. So this a quick and crisp way to not only do damage control for your self-esteem, but also embarass the errant person and help you score a few psychological brownie points!