People think just because I write about frivolous, flippant stuff Saturday after Saturday, that I am a flaky kind of guy who really doesn’t take life seriously. But that isn’t true at all, I promise you. I have a tender, caring heart and am deeply saddened by many things. Given below is a random — but by no means comprehensive — list of things that regularly move me to tears.
Any man whose DP is a pic of himself holding a mic. Watching video clips of carefully made-up, glamorously attired young women doing sinuous moves to a Punjabi number with a Sintex tank or a bewildered buffalo in the background. Moody, pouty selfies on FB with quotes about inner beauty by Charles Manson or Yo Yo Honey Singh wrongly attributed to Maya Angelou and Raja Ram Mohan Roy.
Photographs of lone men eating dried up naan with the last of the paneer butter masala on some random terrace.
Watching the thanks section that comes before the title sequence of all Malayalam movies. Telugu movie folk repeatedly saying ‘peru peruna’ and ‘manaspoorthi ga’ at filmi functions. Tamil movie folk repeatedly interspersing all talk with ‘vandhu’ and ‘pathinga-na’ . Being asked by Netflix if I can’t decide what to watch.
Going to the Tasmac Elite shop and having to maintain a stoic silence despite being charged more than the MRP.
Looking at Indian men in slim-fit trousers. Encountering men with ponytails or man buns who bring guitars to parties. NRI seniors walking around in Bermuda shorts and monkey caps on Besant Nagar beach in November.
Middle-aged men who’ve never so much as played a Casio VL-Tone referring to each other as ‘rockstar’.
Watching owners of expensive cars drive off magisterially, unaware that their front tyre has just been comprehensively peed on by the raggedy stray near the potti kadai .
Anyone having a mic shoved in their face as they are coming out of the first-day-first-show of a Pongal or Deepavali release, and being asked ‘So how was the movie?’ Anyone answering the doorbell to find the callers to be a smiling couple holding an invite to their daughter’s arangetram .
South Indian men wearing achkans , dupattas and chadaus at sangeet ceremonies. North Indians trying to say ‘ sambar’ . Men whose elaborate comb overs have come undone by a gust of wind and are unaware that their painstaking morning effort is now sitting by the side of their head like an upturned rodent.
Anyone at a wedding reception, waiting in queue to hand over gift-wrapped alarm clock or Rathna Stores Gift Coupon to newlyweds. Newlyweds.
Any person being covered with a zari shawl at a sanmanam .
Men and women in the first row of a poetry reading. Men and women in the first row of a performance poetry reading. Performance poets. Man or woman waiting with outstretched hand to take mic from co-panellist. Reasonably well-to-do folks waiting in queue for butter biscuit and masala tea at low-budget book launch. Reasonably well-to-do folks trying to get the attention of the waiter carrying cheese-and-pineapple at big-budget book launch.
Attendee trying to convince the barman to oblige him with one last whisky at book do after the bar is closed.
Man or woman standing next to poet (either on the mookuthi side or the other side) and posing holding her book. Men or women photographed holding up hand to be the next to ask writer a question-cum-essay at Q&A session of book launch.
People who have done yoga and are pretending to be calm.
Krishna Shastri Devulapalli is a satirist. He has written four books and edited an anthology
