It’s A Beautiful World…

“How can you not?!!! Everyone does that!! What’s the meaning of life without it?” This was what everyone was telling me.  But I was never convinced, and remained uninterested all these years. However, I almost changed my mind recently.

There were three reasons for my decision. One, it was an unusually jobless weekend at home. Two, I was at my unimaginative worst and could not think of anything better to do. Three, I always have this constant feeling haunting me that I am growing a slimy green leather coat and tentacles, and slowly turning into an alien. Thus I decided to watch some TV and turned it on…

Zvikk!

The déjà vu I felt actually lasted throughout my escapade. Here was (probably) the same room I saw two years ago. It still had faulty lighting that kept flickering on and off, changing colour each time. The room was still overcrowded with hyper-active people in funny reflective garments. A clothing-deprived female was jumping up and down, and crawling on the floor. “Yet another Hindi movie song”, I thought stifling a yawn and reached for the remote.

Zvikk!
Here was a group of about 25 people obediently taking turns to receive punches from a “hero” about half their size. Each punch was, I still dont understand why, accompanied by a booming sound followed by echoes causing the villain to spit a lot of red, betel leaf juice and become air-borne. He would land about 25 feet away, or sometimes on the rooftop. Aah, Tamil movie! I was quick to recognise. If it was Hindi or Mallu, the villains would only fly less than 10 feet.

Zvikk!
Here was the same old guy with semi-suicidal tendencies trying to put his hands into, this time, an African crocodile’s mouth and ALSO trying not to get bitten! This time a huge yawn escaped from me for it couldnt be stifled any longer.

Zvikk!
“Hello! What, your name is Minimol? Cool! Who else is home? Oh, is it? Extremely cool. You mean, you are a HOUSEWIFE! How very COOL COOL!!”  I used to be baffled by the wannabe girl anchoring the show. Would people endure such boredom, even if one gets paid? That was when I found out that I was hugely underestimating the desire girls have for appearing before people in different clothes everyday.

Zvikk!
The hero got into the car. The villains were just around the corner. Just like I had guessed, the car wouldn’t start. The hero tried turning the key again. The engine sputtered again and stalled. The hero uttered the magic words “Shit, dammit, come on, come on!” and banged on the steering, upon which the car sprang into life half a second before the villains could reach him. I am not sure what happened next because when I woke up again after dozing off, an ad was running. I reminded myself to write to the TV company to add a feature that will run a screen saver or switch the TV to standby mode if the remote is not used for 30 seconds.

I was quite surprised. Those guys making these TV shows ought to be a lot more creative. After all, they don’t shave or cut hair!!!

I switched off the TV and went back to my room to resume my favourite activity of staring at the fan, one which I find is more fun, more relaxing and offers infinitely more variety.