The Secret Diary of Hairam Ramesh

Picture courtesy Outlook Magazine

I love Chinese, always have since I was a young boy. Claypot Chicken, sesame vegetable stir fry, sticky rice....yummy yummy yummy. Also love “made in China” goodies. There’s an element of surprise attached to all things Chinese. It works! -is always your first reaction. So what wrong did I do in Beijing? I just said what I have been saying all these years, the only difference, a lot of people heard it. Chiddi and his bunch of boys suffer from a deep paranoia, wonder why? Just when I send BFF cards to my new found Chinese buddies from Copenhagen, the government goes ahead and spoils the party with its needlessly restrictive, alarmist approach. Grow up boys, your suspicious attitude is spoiling my specially created bonhomie with our neighbours.

Far from encouraging my friendly spirit, I get a rap on my knuckles AGAIN. I am no stranger to getting rapped. I had a simple dream of getting rid of worms, not from me silly, from brinjals. And look what they did? They accused me of being a Monsanto agent! I will not listen to you, you- badly- in- need- of- genetic- modification nincompoops!

Beauty knows no language

Mandi, Himachal Pradesh

An un-fair psyche

Last weekend lolling around in a Delhi mall, I spotted a reputed skin clinic’s counter. Do you stock exfoliating scrubs? Yes ma’am we do, but all the tubes I was shown were endowed with magical whitening-brightening formulas. No thank you, I’m happy with my dark skin, can’t I have an old fashioned scrub that will not mess with my melanin production? I walked off empty-handed.

In a light-skin fixated nation like ours, most skin care products have a hidden fairness agenda. From your humble soap, to your moisturiser or even your body cream. Walk in to your local salon and they will offer unsolicited advice and quick fix solutions to your so-called dusky skin woes. It seems as if the whole world is conspiring against your melanin production. In the future, it’s quite possible that we’ll have ACs that release fairness inducing ions, or a wet cleansing tissue that lightens your skin tone with every wipe. Picture this - the dusky and ‘how can she be happy’ dame gets back home after a long gruelling day at the office. She wipes her makeup off with ‘whitewash’ cleansing tissues, takes one long look at herself (I hate me, her heart sobs), switches on her new ‘LG-furiously fair’ AC and drops off to sleep. Morning, she wakes up and is dazzled by her own, much improved reflection. She reaches office, her by-now-fair avatar has her colleagues swooning in ecstasy, the boss takes one long look at her, gives her a shy smile and hands her the long overdue promotion. She lives happily ever after.

Happiness on a budget

It was our first vacation as a married couple. The honeymoon doesn’t count as one, does it? Those were the days when we were perennially broke, yet giddy with happiness. We were inseparable, oblivious of each other’s faults and viewed the world around us through rose-tinted glasses. The much-in-love couple wanted to escape the Delhi heat and zeroed in on Pachmarhi – little known, unsung, located somewhere in Madhya Pradesh. Sounded perfect. Who needs crowds when we had each other for company?

This was the pre-internet era and vacations could not be planned and booked at the click of a mouse. Tickets had to be purchased physically; a mandatory visit to the tourist office was required for information. Pachmarhi is not the most conveniently located. An overnight train ride to the little known Pipariya followed by a few hours on the road would take us to this hill station.

Femmes will be Fatal

Female libido just got a pop-a-pill solution. Pfizer, the pharmaceutical giant that saved mankind (well almost) with Viagra, will soon be launching its female counterpart, the yet unnamed UK-414495. Women all over the world will now be literally on top and why not? Why should men have all the fun!

Did you know Viagra was an accidental discovery by doctors looking to treat angina-pectoris, a heart condition (But haven’t we known all along where a man’s heart lies, whoever said it was the stomach was a big fat liar). So Big-V fortunately or unfortunately was much like Columbus’s stumbling upon America on a voyage to discover India. History repeats itself and how!

Researchers have suggested that Viagra is a noble discovery which has inadvertently proved to be a boon for endangered species (no, not the witty, intelligent kind). Research at the University of Alaska and University of Wales reveals that trade in exotic body parts used as aphrodisiacs has fallen dramatically since Viagra hit the market. Rhinos love it and can now flaunt their horns without a care in the world. Reindeers feel more secure about their antlers and fewer goats are walking the roads with their legs crossed!

April Full

An Icelandic volcano simmered and spewed ash bringing the world to a grinding halt. But the name, Eyjafjallajokull gave greater stress to us. People choked on their coffee, their tongues got twisted, all in an attempt to pronounce an unpronounceable name. A name coined as if a 2 year old was given a free run on the keyboard!

Shifting tectonic plates can now take a well deserved rest. According to Sedighi, an Iranian cleric, “Women who dress immodestly are capable of increasing Earthquakes”. And women in cleavage baring dresses managed to do just that. On “Boobquake Day” femmes let loose a rumble they had not bargained for. In a comedy of coincidences, an earthquake measuring 6.5 on the Richter scale shook up Taiwan, even as Jennifer McCreight spearheaded a “full frontal” campaign against the Iranian cleric.

The Shoa-nia saga kept the nation enthralled with its day-to-day exciting developments fuelled by a mystery lady. The woman turned out to be Shoaib’s first wife. So excited was Shoaib about his impending marriage to Sania, the poster girl of Indian tennis, that he conveniently forgot the presence of his larger than life telephone begum and confused her with his “Aapaa”. He claimed ignorance, feigned memory loss and made a miraculous recovery when the truth threatened to spill over. Barely had we recovered from this hullabaloo, Modi tweeted and triggered an IPL slugfest. A public spat that snowballed into a scandal revealing bigger players, personal liaisons casting doubts over transparency and accountability of the league itself. A mint fresh minister resigned and a witch hunt is on to finish Modi once and for all. But with Modi behaving like Rajnikanth on steroids he’s unlikely to go down easily. Moral of the story? Think twice before you tweet.

Robert Pattinson, Twilight heart-throb, became Hollywood’s yummiest man. He was immortalised in 18 kilos of solid Belgian chocolate. What a waste of good chocolate! Girls Aloud band member, Sarah Harding on the other hand is doing her level best to make her food unappetizing. Harding has admitted that she sprinkles her food with charcoal dust to keep fit! Can diets get any more bizarre?

Beer guzzling men will be surprised to know that this drink was an all- women affair till 200 years ago. According to historian, author Jay Peyton women created beer and for thousands of years operated breweries. It was a drink exclusively meant for them, until the men took over and managed beer bellies. Women evolved and moved on to sophisticated drinks like the “Cosmopolitan”.

But men needn’t despair. There’s good news for them as well. You can now check out that hot chick and not feel guilty about it. Men it seems are programmed to have a lustful, wandering eye. So next time your wife raps you on your knuckles for leering at her best friend, just blame it on mother- nature and her faulty programming. And don’t forget to smile. Smiling apparently adds years to your life. Is that your 20th cigarette? Just grin. Remember the broader you grin the longer you get to live. And don’t forget to say sorry to your wife even if it’s not you fault.Research suggests that an apology adds years to your wife’s life.

See, how easy it is to add and deduct years from your life? And in the meantime you can dream about the bathrooms of the future. According to a report, homes of the future will feature bathroom mirrors that will study your BP, heart rate and send them to your doctor. You can also enjoy a broadband connected bath which takes instructions. So it is now very possible to stay at home and never move out at all. This may not be a very bad idea in a place like Delhi.

My smile just got wider, just thinking about the future. Wondering if my bath tub can fix a glass of martini for me, shaken not stirred if you please?


Source

A heady cocktail of Hindustan Times, Times of India, Mail Today, spiked with the Author’s fertile imagination.

Patelgiri

I am filing for adoption of Praful Patel . Sure, he’s too old to adopt, but I can always pester him to adopt me instead. Purba Patel doesn’t sound too bad, does it?

It pays to be a Patel and how. Not only do you get freebies, joyrides and upgrades to first class in Air India; you get to hobnob with the likes of Vijay Mallya and have a private jet ferry you to Phuket, free of cost!

Wait, it doesn’t stop here. You also get to treat the National Carrier as your Daddy’s private garage. The Maharaja can bleed to the point of collapse, suffer massive losses, employees be asked to take pay cuts but I will have no qualms in getting a scheduled flight cancelled and use it as a private jet to ferry IPL players. Trivialities like inconvenience caused to hapless passengers on a confirmed Delhi-Coimbatore flight is not my headache.