Bah! Humbug!

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

Santa looked out at the falling snow through his small window. The calm outside was quite in contrast to the turmoil he was going through. He tried to remember the last time he had been happy. He drew a blank. He was unhappy before all the troubles started. He never wanted to go into the family business. He wanted to be an accountant. It wasn’t a glamorous job, he agreed. But he didn’t want glamour. He had seen celebrity up close. Fame had left both his father, the previous St. Nicolas and his Uncle Roger, the Easter bunny, broken and shattered. To be the most important person in the world for one day and then ignored for the rest of the year took a real toll. His father turned to alcoholism and Uncle Roger became reckless and began to break into homes with little children and steal all their eggs. This continued until the High Council of Festival Mascots stripped him of his title and had him committed to a correctional facility in North Korea. Santa was able to save his father by promising to take over the whole enterprise immediately. He forgot about his dreams and saved his family. Then everything went well until he ran into Lindsey Lohan one day. She introduced him to the other white snow and he was lost to its charms. He stopped paying attention and his assistant, Tim Cook, took over the operation. Cook dismantled everything. First he sold all the reindeer to a Russian billionaire. (All of them except Rudolf. Rudolf escaped captivity and fled to America, where he became the most famous reindeer in the world when he gave an emotional interview to Barbra Walters. His memoir about his struggle became a bestseller and even spawned a Lifetime movie starring Susan Sarandon and Rafalca Romney.) Then, he fired all the elves and got them deported to Middle Earth. Finally, he outsourced the workshop to a Chinese Foxconn facility and Bangalore’ed the back office and logistics. Everything was being done at a quarter of the cost that it used to. Santa was rendered jobless. And once the money disappeared, so did all the starlets. He was left alone, to ponder his fate. And to look at the snow.

If the Mayans were right and the world ended two days ago and you’re reading this while scavenging for food in a nuclear wasteland, then think of this as one of the reasons why mother earth hates your guts and tried to drown your whole species. And if nothing happens – which is a remote possibility because how can a bunch of superstitious tribesmen who lived hundreds of years ago and couldn’t even predict the demise of their own empire be wrong about the future – then welcome to yet another week in which we celebrate the triumph of consumerism.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t hate material things. I love them! If living in India has taught me anything, it’s that there is no problem that can’t be made to go away as long as you’re prepared to throw enough money at it. I’m just tired of celebrating this love every month under the guise of a ‘festival.’ There is always some holiday lurking in the corner, requiring us to buy things for the people around us and forcefully spending time with them. That’s what all the advertisements tell us! There is no amount of heartbreak and pain that cannot be compensated for by a fancy gift. You can be a horrible boss around the year, but if on one day of the year you gift your secretary a box of crappy chocolates and ask her to go home early, you’re a shoo-in for ‘boss of the year.’ Treat your wife like your own personal slave for ten years and then buy her forgiveness by giving her a comically large diamond necklace. To make up for all those times you ignored your grandparents, you can buy them a ring-tone of their favourite classic song for their mobile phone. Most of the time we don’t even realize what we’re celebrating. In one of the biggest festivals in the country, we celebrate a guy who went to war to defend the honour of his wife but then dumped her because his laundry guy said something uncharitable about her while we burn the effigy of a guy who respected women enough to take no for an answer.

Twitter is the last refuge for all those who want the festive masses to get off their lawn. However, this year on twitter there was a backlash against the backlash. Mostly from nostalgic NRIs missing the deafening sound of firecrackers and the breathlessness brought on by the large amounts of smoke. They told us to stop whining and start appreciating our good fortune. This is what India is all about, they fumed. Which was true, because who else would know more about the ‘authentic Indian experience’ than a person who, before visiting, ingests enough pills to immunize an entire African country? Thanks for your advice, captain. I’ll keep it right next to those unopened boxes of Ferrero Rocher you love to bring over.

Even the Mayan apocalypse won’t be able to make me open them.

The best Gandhi commemoration E-V-E-R

Have you ever looked at your skewered history books, seen some obscure English words describe the freedom struggle and heard about a man called Gandhi?

If yes, then have you ever thought to yourself, that you should do something to celebrate his memory but have never found an appropriate forum/hallmark card?

Then you're in luck. Thanks to the wonderful people at Mont Blanc, now you can.

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi’s iconic Dandi March in 1930 to protest against the British salt tax has inspired pen-makers Mont Blanc to come out with a limited-series pen on the Father of the Nation.

The high-end pen is priced around Rs.14 lakh, according to a watch retailer.

The pen comes with a gold wire entwined by hand around the middle, which “evokes the roughly wound yarn on the spindle with which Gandhi spun everyday.”

Inspired by the “241 mile” march, the white gold pen, of which only 241 pieces will be available worldwide, boasts of a hand-crafted rhodium plated 18-carat gold nib depicting Gandhiji holding his trademark lathi — all in gold.

You see ladies and gentlemen, nothing evokes the memory of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi then a pen which costs more than a million rupees.

Forget how many children you could feed with that money. Or how many medicines you could buy for people who cannot afford them. Hell, let's even forget how many cottage industries can be supported.

Gandhi never cared about shit like that.

Nope.

That dude was all about the bling-bling.

If you remember, all of Gandhi's clothes were custom made. He was a style icon for millions of people. He was busy spoofing Salman Khan's man boobs bare chest a few decades before Salman Khan was born.

Now go do your patriotic duty and buy this pen.

Because that's exactly what Gandhi would have done.

 

‘Mahatma’ pens from Mont Blanc [The Hindu]

The lowdown on Diwali gifts

My Dad assigned me the unenviable task of deciding on Diwali gifts to be give to all our family & business associates. So after a through market research, (which was basically me sitting with a bottle of my favorite beverage and coming up with random crap) I thought it should be shared with the world, since I worked so hard for it. Needless to say, I could not come up with anything and waited till the last minute to tell my Dad to give all that money away to the poor. And by poor, I mean my resource hungry vodka fund. Same thing, right? So anyways, here is my first annual diwali market research:

(1) A box of dry fruits - If you get this gift from someone, then consider yourself at the bottom of their food chain because this is the most common diwali gift. Not only does this box signify that the giver does not like you. it means that if there is ever an alien invasion in your city and your acquaintance has to choose between your life and the life of his pet cat who might die in the next few months anyway, he would choose the cat. Life sucks. Move on.

(2) A box of "imported" chocolates - This signifies that the sender wants to prove to you that even though a recession is just around the corner, he is really doing good at his job., he really does not give a crap. By giving you a box of chocolates , the giver says to you "I hope you choke on these chocolates which the people of Dubai refused to eat and die. But before you breathe your last, please remember that I make more money than you. Cheers. And happy Diwali."

(3) Crockery - This is usually given to people who give you the box of imported chocolates. This might include things like gold plated spoons or pudding sets or both. Giving gifts at diwali is like a game of poker anyway. This gift sends the message "I see your imported choclates and raise you a fourteen piece gold plated pudding set. Suck on that, Chewbecca."

(4) Gold / Silver glasses - Nothing says I heart you during diwali then gold or silver glasses. This is given to all the important business associates and people you actually would choose over your dying cat. However, most people don't have any use for such gifts because not everybody wants to live on the sets of Umraoo Jaan. In fact, the only use of such gifts is to pass it on to other suckers like yourself.

(5) Alcohol - Usually given to people you know in the government who help you with all your illegal stuff. It consists of some foreign made whiskey because people who have answered the call to serve the country do not have a taste for Indian made liquor no matter how many hot models Vijay Mallaya hires to pose for his calendar.

(6) A large box of Juice - This is now a very popular gift item. That is because people really want to eat "healthy" nowadays. And by eating healthy I mean they want to ape the cast of The Bold and the Beautiful. This gift comes with a message which says "I really think you need to lose some weight you fat piece of turd. So here, have some liquid which looks like pee and tastes like crap flavored with sugar and will end up increasing your heart rate. Happy Diwali you Obese Son of a Bitch."

(7) A box of Indian Chocolates - Usually given to employees by companies doing well. This signifies tells the employee that "the company respects you and your hard work by spending the bulk of the diwali gift money budget to buy expensive champagne for upper management. So please take this box of Perk chocolates and go home to the family you rarely get to see because of us. Oh, and we might fire you soon. Happy Diwali, biatch." Of course, since most employees are Indian, they'll bitch about anything you give them so why try, really.

(8) A box of Biscuits - This gift is given to people whose house you frequent because of some social obligation or the other. This gives a message "Stop serving that home-made crap everytime I am forced to drink that vomit your wife makes and serves in a cup. At least have something decent around so that I can not sit there with that expression of disgust on my face. Happy Diwali, you crazy piece of sh*t."