"Hell Down Under"

It was really awkward to hear so many beeps in between despite of the fact that I could understand the flavor of abuses exchanged among six handsome guys and gals standing along with their Karizma bikes. I am talking about ‘Roadies’, the famous reality adventure show that is being aired on MTV. I have been following this show since mid of 5th season and now it is in final few stages of 6th season in Australia.

I am not really fond of reality shows, so much so that I would write a blog on these. But there is something special about this show that I can’t resist my temptation to deify it. ‘Roadies’ is the show that is a adaption from popular reality show of AXN known as ‘Fear Factor’, or we can say it is the Indianized version of AXN’s one. ‘Roadies’ had started with the audition rounds that were worth watching. Many aspirants were interviewed (or I would say persecuted) by two bald gentlemen named Raghu and Rajiv (creators of this show). The candidates seem so traumatized on screen that reminds me of our ragging days in college. And now after seeing their reaction, we feel so entertained as if Raghu is taking revenge against our seniors on our behalf. I think these candidates should be given a prize for atleast attending these interviews.

Anyways, after interview rounds, we got to see some 20 odd people fighting for their survival in game show. They compete among themselves in different tasks and bitch against others through vote-outs. Some tasks are too exciting and funny that can send shivers down your spines. In one of the task the guys had to take a hit on their private parts…another one had a mud pit that host two small agile crocodiles and participants had to collect some reward chips that were scattered around the two beasts, and some of the chips were tied to crocodile’s tail…!!! Not even dangerous but these tasks were exciting to watch over television and these are certainly not meant for people with weak hearts. There was one episode that had left many guys ogle the screen with their limping tongue… for one of the task, the participants had to dive in a small swimming pool and create maximum splashes that can wet the white, skinny t-shirts worn by three sexy Australian models standing nearby, so much so that the alphabets printed over their tummy could be visible through their translucent garment…and then two participants had to unscramble these letters to make as much logical words as possible…!!! The whole concept was so thought off, that I couldn’t imagine comparing ’Roadies’ with ‘Fear Factor’. This is the height of creativity..!!! The show not only involves task performance but politics and bitching behind, during vote-outs. Sometimes your favorite one and most deserving candidate gets voted out and show takes a new turn.

Sometimes I imagine why this show has attracted so many viewers of different age groups. Apart from exciting tasks, unexpected vote-outs, glamour, fear and creativity involve in making the show, there is something in our mind that aspire us to see candidates struggling in the show. Talking about self, it takes hell lot of courage to sit beside the fiery crocodiles or hang over the river or fighting against two heavy weight WWE wrestlers. And it is this courage that attracts me to see these episodes again and again. Every individual has a dream to do something courageous, outstanding and against all fears and odds, and when he gets the chance to see someone performing on his lines, I guess it is natural for one to get charged up. My favorite participant in ‘Roadies’ is Sufi because even after being hurt in wrestling, he managed all his further tasks while on crutches. It is this spirit that can make a person stand against their personal comfort zone and be noticed in the crowd. How many of us can afford to do that in real life???? How many of us have the courage to quit the normal office job and work for a NGO…how many of us can challenge the government and ask them about their performance…how many of us can go to police station and complain about injustice if seen by you??? There are many ‘how-many’s that can reflect in negative responses and still we want to prosper in our life. It’s not like, to show courage you need to jump over a wall; the real courage is to get out of your comfort zone and start experimenting or else wait for the experiences that can tumble you down with shaken feet.

Southern expedition

One fine afternoon, as we were strolling through the beautiful lanes of Infy campus towards food court to have our lunch, I initiated a interesting topic to infuriate my colleague …'South Indians'. He is a Tamilian and had been in Chennai for quite some time. So I could find the true companion to answer my queries. I was always fascinated with different cultures and behavior that can be observed in different part of this nation. Although the points that we had pointed out were discussed in jocular manner, but the following content may hurt people who hails from South India. Anyways on a lighter note....

The food

I must admit, they have a great appetite when it comes to eating rice. Sometimes I fathom, if rice wasn’t grown at all in this country than entire southern generation would have wiped out. Almost everything in a meal has some imprints of rice like idli, plain rice, biryani, wada, dosa etc. During the lunch break, I could see people carrying a big 15cm diametric plate and stuffing it with all the rice at once making a huge pile till the crest. One of my team mate used to carry his lunchbox which had three compartments: first section consists of plain steamed rice, second one consists of curd rice and the last special one consists of colored rice (I couldn’t find it different from the first one in taste). Mostly the people use their hands to have their meal, mixing rice with curd, sambhar, special chutney etc. at one go. So a new special dish comes out of their creativity..!!! Believe me, it gives you great pleasure to eat rice with your hands but the worst part is to accompany those stained fingers to the wash basin while the sambhar still trickling down.

Movies

The south Indian movies are the great innovation of the Indian cinema. They have the due potential to beat Matrix or any of the James Bond’s flicks and the heroes are more than the idols who are worshipped by the fans here. Some of the names I could recall are Chiranjeevi, Balaya, JrNTR, Balakrishna etc etc…In these movies, the actors are the real heroes who can fight, dance, emote, laugh at the same time and in the same movie…!!! Even Keenu Reaves would have fainted to see hero on the motorcycle toggling the roof of trains or on the horse sliding beneath the lorry or lifting the tractor out of the field or cutting the bullet into two pieces etc etc…Apart from the action scenes, they could be found dancing with heroines with half the age as them. I don’t know what for these actresses are paid for in movies when 80% of the frame is occupied by the actor, 15% for the dance numbers and rest 5% in the rape scenes.

Festivals

South India is very famous for its temples, festivals and religion. No offence to mention, but these festivals and corresponding celebrations are limited to worship of God only. I once asked my colleague, how would he like to celebrate Diwali or Ugadi (which is comparatively more famous here) and the reply was that he would decorate the huge ‘puja ghar’, will call all relatives to the home and offer prayers. More auspicious occasion is for celebration, more is the intensity to offer prayers. Their sacred devotion is much more prevalent than pump-and-show that is famous in North Indian celebrations. If these guys are invited to attend Diwali in Delhi, than I fear they would go blank after seeing so much of lights and hearing the clamor of crackers…!!!

Nature and behavior

By nature, south Indians are simple, down-to-earth and intelligent. It’s a known fact that the secondary board examinations are best in South India and you could easily perceive the fact that maximum percentage of Indians found in US belongs to this region. When I was boarding my aircraft to Amsterdam, I could see 85% south Indians sitting and chatting with air hostesses in their typical English accent. Infact the south Indian languages seem so indifferent to me that I couldn’t recognize them by hearing to their pronunciation. Once an autorickshaw driver made perfect use of this language when I was travelling in Bangalore. After my trip in the auto, while bargaining for the fare, all of a sudden, he had forgot all the Hindi dialogues he remembered and resorted to Kannada to fool me that he doesn’t knew a word of Hindi (though he was speaking fluent Hindi with his friend on cell phone...!).

Its not that the other parts of the country are devoid of such observations, but all they seems to be peculiar to me during my 2.5 years of stay in south India. North Indians have their own language, festival, ways of celebrations, food habits and nature similar to as South Indians have. I am sure foreign guests would have hard time to understand the entire gamut of culture we have.