“I wrote the post about Vegetarians on Thursday and I hadn’t checked Facebook for a while and finally when I did, it had 1500 shares!” says, Localteaparty, the blogger who became popular within months.
Localteaparty is a website with a funny take on things. If you’ve read Inscrutable Americans by Anurag Mathur, you might like this blog because the language is similar. Written in a style of English that draws from Indianisms and is vastly influenced by Hindi. “I read a piece on this blog called, New Indian’ and it used a similar language, I remember laughing a lot and I thought of doing something similar,” he says.
Localteaparty’s popularity is such that another blogger, Kartikay who runs >mochachillo.wordpress.com ran a piece titled, ‘Who is this Local Tea Party’ in April 2011 literally stalking Localteaparty’s comments, twitter and more to figure out who he is; the comment thread to that post is still active. “I was mind-blown, because the ‘mochachillo dude’ had done a great deal of research, he literally went looking for a needle in a haystack and I should say he was successful,” he laughs. This anonymity regarding his identity is perhaps what keeps the fun alive on the blog. “It is helping me build readers because many people write to me saying that if they knew who I was, they probably wouldn’t read my stuff. The mystery is alluring to many,” he says.
Localteaparty is not all that anonymous either, if he is motivated enough, he meets people in real-time, “but to a larger audience, I’d like to be anonymous,” he says. Localteaparty also had a ‘nemesis’ who put up something called ‘Anti Local Tea Party’ but over time, the posts stopped. “I was very flattered when Anti Local Tea Party came up, because it meant people were actually reading my stuff!” he adds.
Local Tea Party garners an average readership of 300 people in a day, without new posts, for a few of his posts the numbers have gone up to 25000 unique readers as well. What makes Localteaparty write what he does? “I want to be more frequent, but I would attribute my posts to short temper; I let the idea soak into my head, I take notes on my phone and then when I feel like I have enough, I write a post,” he says.
The 31-year old unmarried Localteaparty maintains his anonymity; ladies take note!
-V.B.
Who: Local Tea Party / Anonymous
What: His writing is mostly satirical. He talks about society in general and puts forth observations in a funny ‘Indian English’
Link:>http://thelocalteaparty.com/
Quick read: In a post about how the television isn’t a family thing anymore he says, “Have you tried watching TV with your parents? Don’t. If you still want to do so means, all the best. First of all it is the most confusing and frustrating experience you will have in your life. You will be watching some movie for a long time. Nobody will be around. But I don’t know from where they will come, but the moment two people are kissing on screen, the parents will appear from somewhere and stand behind you. I am thinking the kissing will be at romantic level and will go away in one second or so. But at that time only those two will passionately roll on the floor and just not stop it. Oh god, terribly embarrassing it will be. And on top of that the parents will ask ki, ‘What movie you are watching?’ As if it is very important now. Boss, I myself am upset right now.”
