A Text from the Government

“Marry at an early age. Delay first child. Have sufficient gap between first and second child.”

Now, if someone were to tell this to you, who do you think it would be? If I were to take a shot at it, here are some plausible guesses:

1. Your parents.
2. One of those meddlesome relatives that always transpires when there’s talk of marriage in the family.
3. Your newly married acquaintances that are still in that phase of enthusiasm that distinguishes an early convert from a weary veteran.
4. A Karan Johar movie.

On the other hand, here is a list of entities that are quite unlikely to ever tell you something like this:

1. Al Qaeda.
2. Your unmarried friends.
3. Deodorant advertisements.
4. A James Bond movie.
5. The government.

So imagine my surprise when the government gave me this matrimonial advice via the admittedly modern (for a government) medium of text messaging. As any single Indian person in my age group would know, once you’re beyond a certain age, you pretty much prepare yourself for everyone around you to be trying to convince you to get married – whether it’s parents, grandparents, random relatives, friends or acquaintances. What you're not prepared for, however, is for the government to also join the “get married” chorus. You pay taxes to the government, the government fines you if you’re drunk while driving, the government takes you through endless layers of red tape whenever you need anything from it, the government randomly digs up certain stretches of the road on your way to office – these are the sort of things you’re primed to expect from the government. Marital advice from the government, however – now that can completely throw you off-balance.

I suppose for the government, this is the perfect sort of reply to a lot of its detractors that have been complaining that the government has not been doing anything much at all ever since it took oath – that policy paralysis has meant that the government has just sat and twiddled its thumbs while the economy went for a lazy stroll downhill, or that the only thing the government was active in was corruption. Well, for all those detractors, I’m pleased to say that the government has been quite active when it comes to texting. It’s not just personal marital advice that the government has been giving me – it has given me helpful tips to avoid dengue, it has asked me to design a mascot for the Income Tax Department so that I’m perfectly fine giving away chunks of my salary as long as there’s a friendly smiling mascot present, and it has also asked me to pay service taxes just in case I’m a food business.

As is customary with a lot of the things that the government does, this whole business of the government sending texts does not make any sense. Think about it – it was the government that came up with the regulation in the first place to ban commercial SMSs so that ordinary consumers were not troubled by pesky texts through the day. And what does the government do once those texts stop – send texts of their own!

At the same time, however, this does raise a lot of interesting questions. Who in the government first came up with the idea of sending text messages to citizens? Is this the government trying to keep up with the times and be ‘with it’ by showing that it can also communicate through texts?

More importantly – is there a centralized government department that just deals with texting? I’m guessing there should be – otherwise if all government departments started sending their own texts willy-nilly, things would really get out of hand and we’d be inundated with 50-odd texts every day. A centralized texting department also fits in well with the government’s fondness for regulation – it would mean that the texting department gets applications for sending texts from all other government departments, which are then duly processed by a committee that decides what messages are approved to be sent, which ones are rejected, if any amendments need to made to the copy, etc. In which case, how does one get into this department? It kind of sounds like a fun job!

And it could be made even more fun if the texting department started using texts as a tool for foreign policy. Instead of wasting time in state-level meetings, it could begin communicating foreign policy in the form of text messages. Here are some possible texts that could be sent:

To: Government of Pakistan

Being best friends with the Taliban is like leaving your child in the custody of a grizzly bear. It could only lead to disaster – ha ha.

Ministry of External Affairs, India.

To: Non-Aligned Movement

Just checking – why are we still in existence? Didn’t the Cold War end like 20 years ago?

MEA, India

To: Government of USA

This is all very confusing. Are we strategic allies, regional allies or key allies? Also, what’s the difference? Oh, and Osama found in Pakistan!!! Lol! Told you not to trust the Pakistanis!

MEA, India.

To: Kingdom of Bhutan

Of course we haven’t forgotten u! What nonsense! Tell you what – how abt we make your king the chief guest for the Republic Day parade? Warm Regards.

MEA, India

To: Government of Mongolia

Fresh spices, high staple-length cotton and the finest iron-ore – these could all be yours, in exchange for some weapons-grade uranium. If interested, please get in touch.

MEA, India

Ok, I think I should stop now, before one of the copywriters for the Idea ads gets a brainwave out of all this and creates a typically daft ad about governments across the world bringing about world peace by sending each other friendly text messages.

Life Isn't Like a Panda - There are Shades of Grey!

They say a picture can speak a thousand words. This isn’t necessarily a good thing. Navjot Sidhu can speak a thousand words. Mamata Banerjee can speak a thousand words. The question is - would you really want those thousand words to be spoken to you? The truth is there are times when you really do not want a picture to speak a thousand words. Take, for example, those ‘friends’ of yours that incessantly put up pictures of themselves or of their innumerable vacations on social networking sites. As soon as the picture tries talking to you, you wish it would just shut up – a thousand words in such cases could lead you to inflict grievous self-harm.


And then there was this curious phenomenon that saw pictures of cute furry animals being the rage in the email forwarding universe. I’ve often wondered if the inventor of the email feels that his achievement has been tarnished by the fact that it directly led to the invention of the forward. What was it that made somebody think “Hey, my friend is having a terrible day at the office. He’s just been looked over for promotion, this girl he was interested in is sleeping with his arch nemesis and he got car-jacked on the way to work. Why don’t I put together some pictures of cute, furry animals and email it across to him? That’s bound to cheer him up!”


At this point, you might want to tell me “So some people like to spend all their time putting together pictures of cute furry animals and sending it to everyone on their mailing list in the hope that it gets circulated again and again. What’s the big deal? It’s not like they’re harming anyone, or that it makes any difference to grave matters of world affairs. So why are you ranting about this?” That’s where I’d beg to differ – the equivalent of sending forwards of cute furry animals has actually taken place at the pinnacle of global politics, and has had a significant outcome on the course of geopolitical events over the last few decades.


Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce to you…(drumrolls)….Panda Diplomacy!


To begin with, let’s look at the background - 
1945 - The Second World War is over, and to keep themselves occupied most major world powers are engaged in this cat-and-mouse game that’s called the Cold War. China joins the ranks of the communists and is an ally of the Russians – hence making the US antagonistic towards China. This goes on throughout the 1950s and the 1960s – there are no diplomatic ties at all between the US and China.


By early 1970s, though, the situation began to change. The US and China decided they couldn’t ignore each other any longer, and Richard Nixon announced a visit to China in 1972. The Chinese, methodical as always, thought long and hard about what steps could be taken to improve ties between the two countries. There were all the usual measures – removal of trade barriers, opening of diplomatic channels, paradigm shift in foreign policy…that sort of stuff. But this was all regular stuff that often happened at summit-level talks – there was nothing new or remarkable about this, nothing that would really get the people excited, nothing that would yank them out of their state of apathy and jolt them like a cold-water shower on a rainy winter day.


And that’s when the eureka moment struck – pandas! Why not gift Nixon a pair of pandas? When the Americans saw the Chinese gifting Nixon a pair of pandas, it was sure to melt the hearts of even the most cynical commentators. And it did – the pandas were donated to the Washington zoo amidst great fanfare and were a wild success. Over a million Americans visited the pandas in the first year alone – and the US-Chinese relationship has not looked back since then, going from strength to strength. Well, at least until the day the Chinese wake up and ask the US to return all their money!


For those of you wondering what Nixon’s return gift was, it was a pair of musk oxen – but this did not receive as much publicity, possibly on account of the Chinese not being too pleased about the fact that the musk oxen did not arrive with cooking instructions. 


While this was the most famous example of Panda Diplomacy, it wasn’t the first or the last – until the 1980s China had donated about 2 dozen pandas to various countries as a sort of ultimate gesture of grand goodwill towards that country (no prizes for guessing how many India got – none). So there have been a few other instances when that last option was ticked in response to the second question in the Panda Requisition Form. For those curious, this is what the Panda Requisition Form looks like.

In the 1980s, though, things got even more interesting. China decided that rather than gifting the pandas, it would loan them to countries for the price of 1 million dollars a year! A panda loan - that would surely be far more interesting than getting one of the usual calls for a personal loan that most of us keep getting. Imagine this – you’re a high ranking official in, say, the British government, and your phone rings one fine morning:


You: Hello?
Chinese-sounding voice at the other end of the line: Good morning, Sir! I’m calling from the Chinese government. You want panda loan?
You: No thanks, old chap. I'm afraid I'm not interested.
Panda loan salesman: Only 1 million dollars a year, Sir. And pandas…they are very cute and cuddly. You’ll like, Sir.
You: That's all jolly well, old fellow...but I really don’t need a panda right now.
Panda loan salesman: We give you one month’s supply of shoots and leaves. For free! And we give you import waiver document. And we no charge for shipping and…
(Disconnect phone)


Perhaps India could take a leaf out of China’s book and use cute, furry animals during summit-level talks with Pakistan – what have we got to lose? Rather than the usual abrupt end to the talks when both parties go back sulking and blaming each other, it could turn out something like this:


Zardari: Listen, Manmohan. You know the drill; we’ve been through this before. There isn’t any major breakthrough going to happen as that would mean either you or me losing face politically and consequently the next election. So we need to come up with something that’ll make it look like we’ve made progress and this hasn’t been a massive waste of time.


Manmohan: You’re right, people are tired of these Confidence Building Measures – it’s starting to wear a little thin. We need some fresh ideas that’ll make it look like real progress is being made. So I hired a creative agency to do some brainstorming and come up with something new. I think you’ll like what you hear – they’re very persuasive and use a lot of big words and analogies.


The head of the creative agency – a crisp, suited Don Draper-type character confidently strides into the room with a nonchalantly arrogant air about him.


Crisp, suited Don Draper-type character: Confidence Building Measures. Let’s begin with the name, gentlemen, because the name is what sets the tone. Confidence Building – you know what that says? That there’s currently zero confidence between India and Pakistan! That may be the reality – but do the people want reality? NO! People want hope, people want dreams, and people want to go to bed dreaming of a brighter future. That’s how all the big brands are built – Coke, Intel, GE – they all promise a better tomorrow. That’s why blockbuster movies with happy endings far outsell gritty realist movies – people want an escape! So let’s not call it Confidence Building – let’s call it Confidence Enhancing. This suggests that there’s already confidence between India and Pakistan – it just needs enhancement. 
And measures – why use such a dry word? Do you think people connect to measures in an emotional way? NO! Measures are seen as mathematical and functional – people don’t want that! Your marks are a measure, your weight is a measure, your targets are a measure – would anyone want to be reminded of that? NO! People remember milestones, not measures! Your first kiss, the day you graduated, your first paycheck, your wedding date – people live their lives from one milestone to the next. Milestones are what you measure your life by; milestones are what you’re left with when you look back at your life. So let’s call it milestones instead of measures. So what we have then, are Confidence Enhancing Milestones as opposed to Confidence Building Measures. Confidence Enhancing Milestones – doesn’t the mere sound of that fill your heart with hope? In fact…


At this point a kitten walks into the room across Zardari’s chair.


Zardari (excitedly looking at kitten – until now he had a particularly stiff demeanor – suddenly it is replaced by unbridled joy): Oh my God, Manmohan! Is that kitten yours? It’s like the cutest thing ever! Can I please have it? I’ll give you anything in return – take all of Kashmir. In fact, take NWFP as well while you’re at it – I have no idea what the hell to do with that region. I’m sure you could make it into a tourist destination or something – it has mountains. We’ll also hand over Hafeez Saeed to you; stop helping Dawood – anything at all, as long as you let me have the kitten. Pleeeeease???


65 years of bitterness ended by one cute kitten. No wonder those forwards are so popular.

Somewhat Historical

If there’s one subject from school that no one seemed indifferent about, it was history. In a way, history was the chicken liver of academic streams – you either loved it or you hated it, and most people hated it. And although I hate chicken liver, history had always been a fascinating subject for me - full of intriguing stories made boring by the fact that you had to memorize them. 


What was rather baffling, though, was why history had to be the same every year. At the beginning of each year, history started with the ancient civilizations – the Indus Valley, the Egyptians, the Mesopotamians (also known as the Sumerians just to confuse you) and the Chinese. After then briefly touching upon the Greeks, the rest of the world would be forgotten about and the focus would shift to India, with the chapters on South Indian kingdoms being skipped if you were in a North Indian school. Finally, every year, history would end with India gaining independence. 


It wasn’t the same with other subjects – you learnt something new each year. For all the other subjects, people seem to have put some level of thought and planning – presumably breaking up the year-by-year syllabus on level of difficulty, how much a child of a certain age could absorb and other such criteria. But for some curious reason, the person who devised the history syllabus thought “You know what? Instead of children learning something new each year, why not force them to study the same goddamn stuff every single year?” If this were a cartoon, at this point there would be diabolical, crazed-scientist type laughter from the history syllabus guy accompanied by ominous lightning and thunder in the background. Ordinarily, you would expect a person with such thoughts to either be sentenced to death by firing squad, or if that’s too extreme for your liking, be quietly asked to go tend to his gardens and leave the whole syllabus business to someone more capable. But instead, the fellow was hailed as a revolutionary in educational circles “Teach the same thing every year? What a mind-bogglingly brilliant notion that is! Why didn’t we think of this before? Just to silence our detractors, we can have something different for the 10th Standard, but until then, it can be EXACTLY the same. I bet no one would even notice.” 


In spite of all this, though, I still loved history – and history was one of the first things I noticed while walking about Kolkata. Maybe it had more to do with the part of Kolkata I was staying in, but the city just seemed to ooze history. Of course, this isn’t the centuries-old sort of history that envelops you on visiting an actual historical town like Hampi. It’s not the sort of history where if you picked out a building and told me “Chandragupta Vikramaditya used to drink here with Kautilya on Friday evenings” or “This is the park where Sher Shah Suri was relaxing in when he got the idea to build the Grand Trunk Road” I’d believe you. It’s a very recent sort of history, but one that still adds a lot of character as far as a city is concerned. It’s the sort of history where if you told me “India’s first telegraph message was sent from this building” or “This building was inaugurated by Queen Victoria to commemorate cotton trade between India and England”, I’d find that perfectly acceptable. Every second building seemed to have some sort of stately, heritage air to it, as if to tell you “This may look like a dusty, stained and dilapidated building now, but important financial transactions used to take place here – this is where the first business houses started their businesses.” You might think that all this isn’t that big a deal, but it’s utterly fascinating for someone from Bangalore where most buildings tend to be all glass and no character.


And given how deserted the roads tend to get after 10 in the night in Bangalore (or Delhi, for that matter), it was a pleasant surprise to see the amount of people on the streets even at 11. And unlike Mumbai, it didn’t have the feel of “Oh, I work super hard and party super-duper hard so I just have to get from point A to point B and am therefore on the road” – it had more of a “Oh, I just feel like hanging around and killing some time and am therefore on the road” sort of feel to it. People were just milling about – standing and chatting around the pavements, under trees, playing cricket on the streets, etc – no one seemed to be in any sort of rush. And you just felt safe – I know this sounds utterly illogical and has no basis in reason, but think of it this way. Which of these scenarios seem the least likely to occur to you if you’re walking alone late at night?
1. Delhi - A burly Jat driving by screeches to a halt near you; brandishes a shiny pistol and threatens to beat you to pulp, shoot you and then discard your body in some hinterland-type area if you don’t hand him all your money.
2. Mumbai - You’re caught in the middle of some underworld crossfire and are now being chased by them as you’ve witnessed too much to be allowed to live.
3. Chennai - You’re lost and no one is willing to speak to you in a non-Tamil language, leaving you with no choice but to keep walking on the road until you drop dead.
4. A menacing-looking Bengali…See! I cannot even continue with this sentence because the mere mention of a menacing-looking Bengali sounds oxymoronic and has therefore already made this the least likely scenario!


I’m sure I’m wrong on this – there must be heaps of crime statistics out there that prove that Kolkata isn’t any safer than most big cities in India – but it just didn’t feel that way. Even the cops looked friendly – as if they would offer you a cup of tea and a roshogulla before arresting you if you ever did do something that warranted arrest.


Now, a lot of you might protest at this point “What do you mean a Bengali cannot be a dangerous, cold-blooded criminal? I have two words for you – Bob Biswas!” That may be the case, but the feeling I got was more along the lines of what Robert Clive may have felt before deciding to go ahead with the Battle of Plassey. Here was a chap without much of a track record at colonizing – but when he started trading in Bengal, the thought probably struck him “Hmm…the whole trade philosophy of give and take is fine, but I think I prefer just the take part of it. Why don’t I just conquer Bengal? The Bengali may be ferocious in debate, but he’s unlikely to engage in prolonged armed conflict, particularly if I attacked in the afternoon.” Of course, being possessed of a character that’s devoid of imperialistic or dictatorial tendencies, invading Bengal did not cross my mind – but it probably would have if I was predisposed towards such militaristic activities. 


Of course, Kolkata is renowned for its street food – and unlike Tom Cruise, the hype is perfectly justified. But apart from mastering the art of making delicious rolls, the roll shop populace has also achieved mastery over the mathematics of permutations and combinations to create an elaborate menu out of 3-4 basic ingredients. Every roll shop would have 3-4 basic ingredients – chicken, mutton, egg and maybe veg/paneer. The menu, though, would stretch to an entire page, or be painted on an entire wall, thanks to the various combinations of single and double that you could choose for each. Chicken roll, therefore, would form an entire section in the menu, with items in that section coming in the following forms: Chicken Roll, Double Chicken Roll, Egg Chicken Roll, Double Egg Single Chicken Roll, Double Egg Double Chicken Roll, and so on.


Come to think of it, it’s a bit like this post – I’d started thinking there isn’t a whole lot to say and so this would be a short post, but its ended up being about as long as most other posts!

64 Squares

Detractors.

I don’t know what the deal is with detractors, but suddenly they seem to be everywhere. Of course, everyone’s entitled to their opinion, so there’s nothing wrong with some good old fashioned detracting. Take, for example, the government – now that’s an entity that’s worthy of a whole lot of detractors – in fact being a detractor for the government could be a full-time job in itself. Come to think of it, such a job already exists – the opposition. Or for that matter, the BCCI or Akshay Kumar – again prime candidates fully deserving of all the detraction that comes their way – and some more.

When it comes to sports, though, it seems that the matter of detractors has gone one step too far. Take for example, the time when Ben Hilfenhaus took four wickets in an IPL match. Suddenly the media was crowing about how Hilfenhaus had silenced his detractors with his performance. Seriously? Here is a bowler who’d made a splendid comeback to the Australian team by bullying the Indian batting line up in a manner I’d last encountered back in the childhood days watching that bulldog from Tom & Jerry who’d made it a habit to screw Tom’s happiness every episode he featured in. Since then he’s cemented his position in an Australian team that’s teeming with fast bowlers. Who are these detractors? And then there was the time when David Warner scored a century in his second IPL match this season – again the media smugly told everyone that he’d now silenced his detractors. This for a man who’s not only an established force in T20 cricket, but had of late started carrying that destructive ability into ODIs and Test cricket as well? Again – who are these detractors?

What really took the cake (along with the icing and the candles!), though, was when Viswanathan Anand held his world championship crown in the recent title battle. Yes – you guessed it right – even the defending world chess champion has his share of detractors! And it isn’t that he merely has detractors – according to the papers he’s been trash-talked, ridiculed and written off (yes, chess is more dramatic than you thought – more on that later)! Never mind that he’d already defended his crown a couple of times already, and was still in the top bracket of chess players. What was even more puzzling for me, though, was the mention of a chess mafia – it seems that Anand had given a fitting reply to the chess mafia with this victory of his.

Chess Mafia.

What on earth could a chess mafia possibly be?

Think about it – could you EVER have thought that chess was the sort of occupation that could have a mafia? Don’t get me wrong – increasingly the mafia has been infiltrating new territory where they may not have earlier been – but even then, you’d think there’s only so much they could infiltrate. Here’s a list of industries/professions that lend themselves to the creation of a mafia – where you wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow if a mafia was mentioned in connection to them:

1. Real Estate / Construction
2. Drugs
3. Weapons
4. Showbiz
5. Gambling
6. Human trafficking
7. Anything involving Lalit Modi

Here, on the other hand is another list of industries / professions that do not lend themselves to the creation of a mafia – where you cannot, in your wildest dreams, imagine the presence of a mafia:

1. Astrophysics
2. Chess
3. Market Research
4. Paramedics
5. Photographers
6. Florists
7. Anything involving Mother Teresa

If you’re not convinced, try this exercise - take a sentence you would regularly use in connection with the mafia – “3 people were killed and 5 injured in a deadly shoot-out involving the X mafia and the Y mafia. All the casualties belonged to the X mafia as the Y mafia delivered a brutal retaliation to the earlier kidnapping of one of their key members by the X mafia” Try replacing X and Y with any of the words from the first list and you’ll see that it makes for a perfectly plausible newspaper piece – while using any words from the second list just sounds plain ridiculous.

So what could the chess mafia be? This is a question that raises interesting possibilities – here are some classified ads with possible explanations on what the chess mafia actually does:

If you’re now thinking “Maybe chess isn’t all that boring these days after all – what with all the off-board drama that surrounds the game” – you’re in for a surprise – it used to be even more interesting during the Cold War era. At first it was the Americans and the Russians. Yes, it wasn’t just space exploration and the arms race that they were trying to outdo each other in – they were also devoting considerable energy to go one up over each other at Chess. Which is why Bobby Fischer was hailed as a hero when he beat the Russians at chess. Unfortunately for the Americans, he then simply vanished and they pretty much gave up on chess after that – leaving it all to the Russians. This brings us to Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov, and their rather insane world championship match of 1984-85.

At that point, Karpov was the reigning world champion and the darling of the Soviet establishment – Kasparov, 12 years his junior, was seen as the rebellious upstart – someone who wanted the established order to change in favour of a new Russia. Thus, the match had huge political ramifications – it wasn’t just about the chess – it was billed as the ultimate clash that could well decide which Russia emerges stronger. The chess, though, did not live up to its titanic billing at first – within 9 matches, Karpov was up 4-0 – and well on the way to an easy victory, given that the first person to 6 wins (with no points for a draw) would be declared the winner. That’s when things got exciting. Or tediously boring, depending on the way you look at it.

It’s a bit like the Popeye cartoon – at first Bluto kicks the living shit out of Popeye – thrashing him left, right and centre. And then suddenly Popeye gets hold of his spinach can and the tables are turned – now he’s flinging Bluto from one side to the other and beating him black and blue. Except that this whole thing happened in extreme, ultra-slow motion – over a 5 month period. After getting thrashed, Kasparov decided that he was in no position to beat Karpov the way he was playing. So he figured – let me just keep drawing matches until it bores everyone and life becomes a living nightmare for Karpov. For five months this went on – they played about 40-odd matches – Kasparov accidentally winning one at some point, Karpov winning one at another point – and the rest were all draws.

By now, Karpov didn’t know how on earth he would deal with this – he’d lost 10 kgs due to stress – how much longer would this go on? Questions pertaining to existential angst had started gnawing away at his very core. Kasparov may be a madman who’s perfectly happy to play chess for the rest of his life – but is this what Karpov really wanted from life? Wasn’t there so much more he could’ve done in life the last 5 months instead of playing chess? Especially now that it was almost summer? Was he trapped in the middle of a dystopian movie about hell, where he would be forced to spend the rest of eternity playing chess matches against Kasparov?

This was it – the spinach intake had finally been completed – and Kasparov was ready to strike. The next three games – all won by Kasparov! Karpov was like Bluto – utterly defeated and on the verge of collapse – when the Soviet authorities called off the match citing health concerns for the players. Of course, the matches themselves may have been boring, but for sheer overall drama, chess can be right up there with the other sports.

And the best part – it has detractors too!

Celestial Magic

A full-moon night. 

An ordinary-looking chap goes about his night business – brushing his teeth, changing into his night clothes, about to retire to bed – that sort of stuff. It all seems very run-of-the-mill, but you know from the background music that it really isn’t. This is a scene cocooned with possibilities just waiting to burst forth. Then the clock strikes twelve. Suddenly – his night clothes start to get stretched to breaking point, hair sprouts all over his body, his nails morph into outrageous claws and his face transforms into that of a wolf-like beast completely unrecognizable from the ordinary guy that had just brushed his teeth. The clothes are now just a ragged shred hanging from his waist. He howls into the night – that shrieking primal howl that tells you in an instant that something terrible is about to happen.

Ladies and gentlemen, the first celestial phenomenon (albeit fictional) I’d encountered as a child – the werewolf. 

A boarding school childhood meant that there were enough horror stories doing the rounds (if you ever go to the bathroom late at night...) so a werewolf was really not needed to spice things up, but kids always lap up anything to do with horror stories, don’t they? Sadly though, while there seems to have been a huge revival of interest in vampires and zombies of late, the werewolf is still waiting for its modern-day upgrade. I always thought that the werewolf was the more interesting of the lot – there was a Jekyll-Hyde duality to the werewolf that was missing in others. He was the Batman of the evil creatures set – all conflicted in life sorts.  And unlike a vampire or a superhero, a werewolf had no control over when he could turn into one – it wasn’t a nightly affair, or a matter of simply walking into a phone booth and changing your outfit when trouble was afoot – he had to wait patiently for the full moon night to come along.

But coming back to celestial phenomenon – if an occurrence as commonplace as a full moon could lead to the creation of werewolves, what would people come up with when something more big-ticket happened, like a solar eclipse, or the Halley’s comet, or better still, the Venus transit? In the olden days, when science hadn’t explained so much, I suppose it was more exciting – some people would see it as God being angry, some would think this was the day Satan would snatch your soul if you ventured out while the more crafty ones would take this as an opportunity to sacrifice their in-laws. Today, apart from the media hype, nothing much really happens, does it? And the media hype has also taken on a bit of a “we’re trying so hard to make it sound special that it actually isn’t that special” sort of quality to it. In the sense that yes, it is a big deal that the transit of Venus is happening, but while you know that the next Venus transit may not happen for a 100 years, something else would come along – a solar eclipse, Halley’s comet, Hale-Bopp comet, Shoemaker Levy’s comet or worst case, at least an asteroid or a planetoid from the Kuiper belt.

It’s a bit like those special calendar days that keep coming along ever so often – “Today’s date is 06.06.12. If you notice carefully and follow a complex set of calculations involving quadratic parabolic equations and the like, you’ll arrive at the conclusion that the month and day add up to the year on the date. This is a HUGE thing – it’ll next happen only in 07.07.14 – so savour this day like no other! In China, hundreds of couples are getting married in a mass wedding ceremony in Guangzhou to mark this special date”. Next thing you know it, the next special date comes along “Today is 12.12.12 – all three numbers in the calendar date are the same today. This isn’t just HUGE, it’s positively GIGANTIC – and if you do not realize it, you’ll never amount to anything in life – you’ll never be a Bournville one day! The next such date would only come along in the next millennium – 01.01.01 – that’s 89 years away. In China, hundreds of couples are getting married in a mass wedding ceremony in Guangzhou to mark this special date.”

In the olden days, though, the Venus transit used to be a lot more exciting than people turning up at planetariums and wearing odd-looking glasses. I don’t know if any of you have read “The Short History of Nearly Everything” by Bill Bryson - read it if you haven’t! It has this hilarious account of a French scientist/astronomer who was keen on the Venus transit. For those not aware, the deal with the Venus transit is that, well…it’s a little psycho. It happens once and then it happens again 8 years later – so that you start getting complacent and think “Hey, what’s the big deal with this whole Venus transit business - once every 8 years – that’s just twice the amount of time it takes for a world cup to come along!” And then it happens next more than 100 years later – not in your lifetime! And then again it’ll happen in 8 years and then again over 100 years later. And so on till the end of time (or till the end of the Sun). So anyway – this French fellow was so keen he thought it would be a good idea to observe it from India – for some inexplicable reason. So he duly sets out for India on a ship – only to encounter rough seas that delayed his journey. Finally on the day of the Venus transit he was still at sea and could do sweet f**k-all in terms of taking observations or anything due to all the turbulence / whatever the equivalent aquatic term for turbulence is. Not to be deterred, he thought he’d anyway proceed to India – after all the next Venus transit was just 8 years away - no point going back, is there? So he lands in India – has all those usual troubles with food, ill-health, natives and all that (this was the 1800s, mind you) – but eventually is all set with his little observatory – waiting to take down observations – only for it to be cloudy on the Venus-transit day – which meant that once again he could do...absolutely nothing!

If you think that’s where his misfortune ended, think again. After 8 years of fruitlessness, he packs up his bags and decides to head back to France – only to discover on landing that he had been declared dead, his estate was divided among his well-wishers and his wife had married someone else! 

So the next time you curse your life for being tough, think of that poor French scientist and thank your lucky stars.

The Avengers: A (Sort of) Movie Review

A little knowledge, a thermonuclear device, a sibling rivalry – these are all dangerous things. Sibling rivalries could lead to intense jealousy, family crises and in extreme cases, the Battle of Kurukshetra. Actually, scratch that last one – in extreme cases, a sibling rivalry could lead to the world getting destroyed. For all its plethora of superheroes coming together for a common cause, The Avengers is, at its core, a story of sibling rivalry. Now, you might wonder who the siblings in question are – does Iron Man have a long-lost brother called Inert-Gas Man that you didn’t know about? Does Captain America have a forgotten twin who’s now Captain Iraq that you didn’t know about? Or is Shrek actually a brother of The Hulk, something that you always suspected but didn’t voice out loud in fear of being called crazy? The answer, dear reader, is that it’s Thor (the Norse God of Thunder) that has a brother that you didn’t know about – and he’s called Loki.

On hearing that name, you might wonder – what the hell kind of a name is Loki? Why would anyone name their kid Loki? I suspect that’s where the problems start, as far as Loki is concerned. His older brother has the sort of name that positively reeks of the grandeur you would typically associate with a God’s name – Thor. Thor, the God of Thunder, ruler of the dominions over the seven seas, protector of heaven and earth, President of Alcoholics’ Anonymous Sweden – none of these titles sound out of place. But replace Thor with Loki, and it just doesn’t cut it – the name doesn’t fit in any longer, does it? In short, Loki’s name itself means that he cannot aspire to any leadership position of any sort – which is bound to piss you off if you’re a God and expect certain privileges as a birthright.

And I’m pretty sure that’s not all that pissed off Loki – as any kid who’s been the younger sibling would understand, Loki probably never got the leg piece because Thor had first right over it being the elder one; Loki never got his own clothes because he would always be handed Thor’s old clothes (even the Iron Man made fun of Thor’s sartorial sense, so you could imagine how bad it would’ve been for someone like Loki who had to work extra hard to step out of Thor’s shadow and be seen as cool); Thor got hold of the cool toys like the hammer that can level an entire mountain while Loki was left with broken GI Joe figures and an out-of-tune harmonica. In short, Loki had enough justification for a simmering desire to kill all humanity and take over the Earth.

It does, however, make you wonder where Thor and Loki’s parents were in the middle of all this? Couldn’t the father have just called his sons and told them “Listen, whatever it is these issues are, I’m sure we can resolve it over the dinner table – why drag the whole world into this mess? It’s a family dispute after all, so let’s keep it within the family.” Clearly, this didn’t happen, and so a combination of lax parenting and sibling rivalry brings us to the beginning of the movie, where a pissed-off Loki steals the Tessaract. The Tessaract is The Avengers’ equivalent of the object that’s there in every superhero/action movie, the one that’s the “critical and cool-looking artifact of possibly extraterrestrial origin with tremendous power that, if fallen into the wrong hands, could destroy the world and is therefore the object that the good guys and the bad guys fight over during the course of the movie”. In fact, the Tessaract is so important that it is under the direct protection of Samuel L Jackson, now a specialist in playing brave, grave, somber characters who stand for truth and righteousness and could anytime break into inspirational speech mode when the chips are down.

Officially, Samuel L Jackson is answerable to a higher authority imaginatively named “The Council”. But we all know that “The Council” is full of stuffy people who play by the book and are not averse to making heartless decisions such as destroying an entire city if it means saving the world. Of course, this is unacceptable to Samuel L Jackson, and when something is unacceptable to Samuel L Jackson, he does not hesitate to say “Fuck You”. So Samuel revives this long-forgotten operation called The Avengers, that brings together four superheroes – Iron Man, The Hulk, Captain America and Thor (who is technically a God), who join up with Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) who was anyway working for him. Their mission, of course, being to retrieve the Tessaract, foil Loki’s evil plan and thereby save the world.

If, like me, you’re a little illiterate about the world of comic-book superheroes and are wondering “How could they come up with a team of superheroes and not include Superman, Spiderman and Batman?” the answer is not because they have a selection policy as muddled as that of the Indian cricket team. The boring truth is that Superman and Batman are DC Comics’ characters while the rest are Marvel Comics’ characters. It does raise interesting comedic possibilities, however “Oh, we tried calling you but I think there’s no signal in the bat cave, Batman!”; “We thought that with the advent of cellular technology there weren’t any phone booths left where you could change, Superman!” and so on. The exclusion of Spiderman, however, remains a mystery.

But coming back to the movie, it follows an arc similar to most action movies:
1. Starts off with a breathless action sequence with enormous explosions, long-drawn out chase sequences and the like, where you don’t really know who’s killed whom and why.
2. The slower middle-section, where some time is devoted to allow the characters to showcase themselves while the action takes a backseat – Iron Man as the wise guy, Captain America as the uptight one, Hulk as the conflicted one and so on. This is also the section where you start understanding what’s happening and why as the plot is explained in greater detail.
3. The final section, where the great, big, ultimate battle to save the Earth takes place with non-stop action sequences and a prominent US city such as NY or LA being subject to widespread destruction on a previously unimaginable scale.

So in answer to some of the big questions one would typically ask about movies – Is the Avengers predictable? Yes. Is there anything new about the Avengers? No. So why should one watch it? One should watch it because, in answer to some of the questions that are more relevant to action movies – Is the Avengers packed with edge-of-the-seat action? Yes. Are the action sequences well-executed? Yes. Does it have great special effects? Yes. Does all that action get you so involved that you almost find yourself cheering for the good guys? Yes. Is it grand and on a massive scale like a superhero movie should be? Yes. In short, you should watch the Avengers if you’re looking for a big-budget, full-blown Hollywood superhero movie. And the other plus point is that it follows in the Iron Man footsteps of “so what if I’m a big-time superhero good guy that has to save the world from evil? I can still have a sense of humor” – so you see a lot of superheroes trying to be wise guys and come up with witty lines, which is sort of fun.

The only disappointment, I guess, would be Captain America. Now I’m not a comic book geek so I don’t know what Captain America’s deal in life is, but apart from bickering, he does precious little in this movie. He’s like one of those bad bosses who delegates work not because he wants to empower you, but rather so that he doesn’t have to do anything himself. He even manages to get overshadowed by the other members of the team who don’t have superpowers – in fact there’s an archer fellow who’s evil for half the movie but still manages to do more to save the Earth than Captain America!

In the Mood for Trade!

A few weeks ago, there was this curious headline in the newspaper – “South Korea to build nuclear reactors in India”. Further reading revealed that in exchange, India would launch South Korean satellites into orbit – it just made me realize how wonderfully complicated modern trade has really become. I mean, building nuclear reactors in exchange for getting their satellites in orbit? How did the Koreans think that up?

It would've been fun being a fly on the wall in that fateful meeting when the Koreans were going about deciding this:

Korean Trade Minister: We need to get the Indians to agree to launch our satellites in orbit, and of course, keep it there! What can we give them in return? How about oil? I’ve heard India is always short of oil.

Korean Trade Minister’s Aide: We don’t produce oil, sir. But I’ve heard they’re looking for help in building nuclear reactors.

Korean Trade Minister: Excellent. Do we produce nuclear reactors?

Korean Trade Minister’s Aide: No – we decided to focus on cars, consumer electronics and hosting pointless multinational sports extravaganzas, remember?

Korean Trade Minister: So who builds them, then?

Korean Trade Minister’s Aide: The usual suspects, sir. The Americans, the Brits, the Russians, the Chinese, the Japanese…

Korean Trade Minister: Did you say the Japanese??? That’s it, then! Anything the Japanese can do, we can do almost as well, but a whole lot cheaper. That’s the whole point of Korea! They’ve got Honda, we’ve got Hyundai. They’ve got Sony, we’ve got LG. Let’s tell the Indians we’ll build nuclear reactors for them!

Of course, this is not to say that Korea isn’t a perfectly respectable country, economically speaking, and there’s no reason why we shouldn’t trade with them. A lot of you, however, would be surprised to know that India has also signed a strategic trade pact with Mongolia, of all countries! You might wonder – what can we possibly need from the Mongolians?

Historically speaking, Mongolia has been famous for just one quality – aggression. Everyone remembers Genghis Khan, the legendary Mongol warrior-king who can never be mentioned without the word ‘pillaging’ also used in the same sentence. And the Mongols were so persistent in attacking the Chinese whenever they felt like it that the Great Wall of China was erected specifically for the purpose of keeping the Mongols out – and also so that even people on the moon could see how aggressive the Mongols really were.

Which made me think that maybe trading with the Mongols was not such a bad idea after all – there have been times we’ve been left with the feeling that India needs to be more aggressive when dealing with its foreign affairs – who better to learn it from than the Mongols, the one-time scourge of the Chinese? We could give the Mongols spices, bauxite, cattle, rice, telecom services, trucks, and even throw in Navjot Sidhu; in exchange for some of that aggressive mentality – sounds like a perfectly fair arrangement. Unfortunately, though, it turned out that the Mongols had stumbled upon a lot of Uranium in all that barren land of theirs – so they were going to give us Uranium and not the aggression we so badly need. Worse still, Navjot Sidhu was not a part of the exchange!

However, this again goes to illustrate how complex modern trade really is – you may think that someone has nothing to offer to you, only to find out that he’s suddenly discovered natural gas or inherited a lot of Uranium and could now be a strategic partner. This is all a far cry from the trade I’d known when I was a kid – when I’d go hungry the day they gave us samosas for breakfast, because I’d traded it with another kid for sausages – it never got any more complicated than that. So how did trade really begin?

According to economics, trade began when Country A (presumably full of really fat people) decided to produce only butter and Country B (presumably full of Texans or teenagers) decided to produce only guns. While trying to kill someone with a stick of butter, Country A realized that some guns might be handy as well, while Country B decided that butter would be a good lubricant when their guns got jammed. So they got together and exchanged some guns with butter so that both countries had a bit of both and lived happily ever after.

Of course, anyone who’s not dense enough to make the Amazon rainforest look like a barren tract of land would realize that there’s no way in hell that’s a true story. Unlike Shakira’s hips, Economics is not always a shining beacon of honesty. Here’s how trade really began:

When Country A and Country B met up for the first trade summit to exchange guns and butter, Country B realized that they had a huge advantage on their side – guns. So they simply shot all the Country A delegates and walked away with all the butter, without having to give up their guns! After much soul-searching, Country A realized its monumental stupidity and their President remarked – “There may be no better sight than the golden-yellow hue of melted butter; and no better sensation than it’s melt-in-your-mouth texture as you bite into a stick of butter; but by God we need to produce some guns else we’re in deep trouble!”. With this, the President of Country A decreed that Country A better start producing some guns along with butter.

Realizing this, Country B’s President immediately called an emergency meeting with his trusted aide:

President: Well, looks like the trade summit isn’t going to be that straightforward the next time – Country A has also decided to produce guns. What do we do now?

Aide: Well, I guess that leaves us with no choice but to give them something they want in exchange. I came across this product the other day called bread – it tastes perfect with a bit of butter. Otherwise the darn thing is too dry – only health freaks would touch it! Let’s start making some bread – when those guys try their butter on some of our bread, they’ll be more than willing to trade it with us. Plus, our people would also appreciate the improvement that butter brings to the taste of their daily bread.

Thus began the story of modern trade, as well as the modern-day breakfast.

Renewing My License

Necessity is the mother of invention, Euclid is the father of geometry and marketing is the bastard child of mass production. While relationships may change quicker than Kingfisher Airlines’ fall from grace in this age of social networking, these are some of the age-old ones that have stood the test of time. Apart from this simplistic relationship, however, everything in marketing, like life and fashion, is all about change.

Last week, I renewed my ‘branding/marketing person’s’ license by making a trip to small-town and rural Andhra Pradesh. For those of you not clued in to FMCG marketing, one cannot truly be considered a marketing person until you’ve made a few visits to the rural areas to understand what the real market is all about, feel the pulse of your customers, see the other India, that sort of thing. In the brilliant movie ‘In the Loop’, there is a scene where someone accuses General George Miller of not being a real soldier, on account of the fact that he hasn’t really gone into battle, and only does the strategizing bit in Washington. General George’s indignant reply was “What, just because I haven't shot someone in fifteen years, I'm not a soldier? You know, the Army doesn't make you drag some bullet-ridden bloody corpse into the Pentagon every five years to renew your soldier's license!” It’s a bit like that in marketing – you have to renew your license every few years, else you’re unlikely to be taken very seriously.

A rural visit, then, gives you the required ‘street cred’ that adds weight to your suggestions in one of those meetings that decide what to do with the brand. You may make a perfectly valid observation such as “But surely, consumers are not going to react too well to the fact that you’ve increased your price from Rs 25 to Rs 30, even if you try to put a positive spin to it by heavily advertising the fact that your product is now ‘Rs 30 only’!” But if you haven’t gone to the market, you’ll be accused to talking through your hat, “Listen, I’ve been to the market and spoken to the consumers, and they all wholeheartedly agree that they’d rather pay Rs 30 than Rs 25 – they’ll feel that the product is much more premium that way, and it’ll add to their outward sense of self-expression and projection if they pay more for the same product. They will be the envy of all their neighbors. This is the best thing we could possibly do for them.” At the same time, you’ll have no choice but to accept as fact something that may seem blatantly ludicrous “What do you mean, consumers won’t care if we provide a free clutch plate with their packet of salt? Have you been to the market – everyone wants to own a car, and what better way to get them started than by providing them a free clutch plate? Trust me; this is going to blow the competition out of the water! Free clutch plates – they’ll never know what hit them!”

But cynicism aside, of course there’s a lot to learn from such trips and they’re always interesting. Needless to say, I shall not be getting into all that on account of it being work-related and would therefore be insufferably boring for most people, added to the fact that it’s confidential. Not confidential in a “these are vital state secrets critical for the survival of humanity hence this message will self destruct in five-four-three-two-one” sense, but confidential nonetheless. Thankfully, there are a few other things about the trip worth writing about, so I shall delve straight into that.

The first surprise came with the knowledge that the first place I had to go to, Rajahmundry, actually had an airport! The airport building might have been smaller than some of the posh houses you’d find in the rich localities of most Indian metros, but it was a fully-functional-during-the-daytime sort of airport nonetheless. Realizing my folly of having underestimated Rajahmundry, some quick Google research made me figure that Rajahmundry was:

1. As a matter of fact the 4^th largest city in Andhra Pradesh.
2. A city!!! (see point 1)
3. The ‘cultural capital’ of Andhra Pradesh (no further explanation on this cryptic comment was forthcoming, though)
4. A place of great religious significance on account of being on the banks of the Godavari, another river apart from the Ganga that possesses sin-washing-away properties.
5. Posh enough to have an ISKCON temple and big-time retailers such as Reliance who target the ‘second-tier’ towns, but not posh enough to have fast-food chains.

With myths about Rajahmundry being a quaint little village busted, I was sort of hoping that perhaps the claims of spiciness of Andhra food might also be exaggerated (I’m sort of sissy when it comes to dealing with spicy food) – an Andhra-ite had once told me that actual Andhra food isn’t as spicy as the Andhra restaurants in Bangalore make it out to be, and that the Bangalore restaurants just enjoy playing along with the hype around the spiciness of Andhra cuisine, due to the fact that it has over the years developed into a sort of USP for Andhra food. Sadly, though, this statement turned out to be utterly false, and my downfall was brought about by that most trusted of dishes – French fries. Over the years, French fries had sort of become a bit of a go-to dish for me – no matter how dubious the antecedents of an eatery seemed, French fries always seemed a safe bet. After all, how could one really go wrong with the fairly straightforward task of deep-frying sliced potatoes? Well, one could top it off with an enormously generous sprinkling of chilli powder, that’s how one could go wrong! While the other Andhra food I’d had before the fateful French fries experience could still be overlooked on the grounds of them being traditionally spicy dishes, the French fries episode shattered whatever hopes I’d had about the spiciness of Andhra food being exaggerated. If a person is willing to turn French fries spicy, there is no telling what lengths he could go to if he really sets his heart to the matter of cooking.

Given that I was only there for two days and there really wasn’t any time to go sight-seeing, I cannot come up with awesome travelogue type descriptions of the local scenery such as “As the golden sun gradually descended over the ghats of the Godavari, the shimmering glow of the multi-hued river seemed to cast a spell over the teeming masses that transcended all torment and tribulation and enveloped one and all in its undulating ardor”. But there was one other thing that I did notice during the trip. Now, you may have thought that numerology was largely the preserve of bored film stars who’d play around with the vowels in their name by adding or removing the odd ‘e’ or ‘i’ at periodic intervals, or start the name of their films with a particular alphabet. In Andhra Pradesh, though, every third person that owns a car is clearly a fervent believer in numerology. Every third license plate there would have a special number – a 2345, or a 777, or numbers that add up to total 7, numbers that match your goat’s grandmother’s birthday, and so on. Perhaps the only people more obsessed with numbers would be mathematicians or sales people – although in their defence it’s more of an occupational hazard. In Andhra, though, numerology seemed like a way of life – as regular in the lives of the people as the spice in their food.

Branding the Movies!

Here’s the trouble with life – shit happens. And when it doesn’t, there’s constipation, which is probably worse! Ok, now that line has absolutely nothing at all to do with this article – this is neither a philosophical ramble about life, nor does it have anything to do with the fag end of the digestive process. But I just wanted to fit it in somehow – just as the creators of Confident Casanova would’ve reacted when the Confident Group agreed to pump in some money for their new film.

Now, for those of you not aware – well, pretty much most of you, actually, Confident Casanova is the name of a new Mallu film, one that also happens to be the most expensive Mallu film EVER made. It’s the sort of name that stops you in your tracks and makes you wonder “WTF???!!!” Sure, it’s quite likely that the Casanova in question would embody confidence as one of his foremost attributes; but it still seems a little superfluous to say so upfront. It’s a bit like if Rambo was titled as “Strong Rambo”, or if the Godfather were to be named “Powerful Godfather”. After getting over the ridiculousness of the name, it turned out that the word Confident in the movie title was inserted into the name because the movie’s main sponsor was the Confident Group (a Bangalore-based real estate company).

I suppose that this sort of information can set alarm bells ringing for a lot of people and trigger off a chain of apocalyptic thoughts like “Is this what the world is really coming to? Are brands now going to take over our movies? What next – will our textbooks in schools be named after brands as well? Will brands start sponsoring religion as well? Will Leonardo di Caprio plant a brand name in my brain using the technique of inception? Is there any way we can blame this on the BCCI? Can someone please explain to me what on earth the difference between a Llama and an Alpaca is?”

Valid as such apprehensions may be, there is also the prospect of movies with bizarre plot twists that could come about as a result of the marketing chaps climbing into bed and getting cozy with the movie fellows. Rather than risking consumers’ ire by forcing their name onto a movie title, brands could use this as the latest ploy to sully their competitors’ reputations. Here are a couple of twists on some popular movies that I could think of – I’m sure many, far more interesting ideas could come about as a result of further brainstorming and introspection.

The Kingfisher Terminal

The Kingfisher Terminal features Tom Hanks essaying the role of a Bangalore IT professional. Through a strange quirk of circumstances, Hanks is stuck at the Bangalore International Airport for nearly six months, due to the fact that his flight is delayed every single day. Sometimes, just to break the monotony, his flight is overbooked. But the next available flight is never more than 10 hours later. As a result of this, it does not make sense for Tom to venture back home due to the inconvenient fact that he has taken up residence at Electronic City, which is a good 3-hour drive from the airport, and he has to report ridiculously early for an international flight.

The film casts light on the apathy of modern-day airlines towards an ordinary passenger, and how the cut-throat competition in the aviation industry has meant that customer welfare generally ranks somewhere between ‘ethical business practices’ and ‘should we allow polar bears on international flights if they’re willing to travel first-class?’ on their list of priorities.

Despite the hardships faced by Tom, though, the film isn’t one of the all-consuming, depressing sorts that might possibly drive one to the brink of inflicting grave harm upon one’s self or one’s surroundings. Rather, the film poignantly highlights the ability of the human spirit to rise above all adversities as Tom, instead of moping about or going on an abusive rampage against the customer service staff, takes it all in his stride and makes the airport a second home. While at the airport, Tom manages to make friends with the airport staff, learn the entire domestic flight schedule for no apparent reason and even have a fleeting affair with a frequent flyer! Don’t miss out on this heartwarming tale slated for release this coming Friday.

The Airtel Negotiator

A group of crazed terrorists has just taken hostage nearly 200 people in a shopping complex in Mumbai. The whole country has come to a standstill as people watch this saga unfolding live on their TV screens. The city police, the army and the NSG have all been called in as the complex is surrounded on all sides and a strategy to rescue the hostages is being plotted. The Prime Minister himself is monitoring the situation on a lot of fancy TV screens that bring him real-time updates at 7, Race Course Road, a sort of Indian equivalent to all those American disaster movies where Mr. President sits in the Oval Office solemnly surrounded by his generals and advisers and tries to save the world from the impending aliens/mutants/meteorite/nuclear war/etc.

Specially flown in all the way from the US is Samuel L Jackson, who has forged his reputation over the last couple of decades as the toughest negotiator around. BUT…BUT…as soon as Samuel L makes the call to start the negotiations, he runs out of talk time! Despite repeated pleas to his network operator that a crisis situation such as this is worthy of additional talk-time, and that he would happily settle any outstanding amount as soon as he’s done, Samuel L is informed that his request would take 48 hours to be processed. Samuel then puts his negotiating skills, along with his patience, to the ultimate test as he embarks upon a series of calls (interrupted by long spells of instrumental music) with customer service personnel while he tries to figure out a way to convince the network operator to be willing to entertain his plea at such short notice. The swagger with which Samuel had first arrived to begin the negotiations slowly starts receding and Samuel’s confidence visibly drains as the negotiations drag on for hours. Will Samuel finally be able to rescue the hostages? And more importantly, will Samuel be able to negotiate the requisite talk time from his network operator to enable him to get a shot at rescuing the hostages? To find out, catch The Airtel Negotiator, coming soon to a theater near you.