C is for Changi

Last week, Singapore's Changi airport topped the list of the best airports in the world in the 2014 Skytrax awards. It did so last year too, and this is the fifth time it has been named the best airport in the world. These awards are based on nominations from 12.85 million travellers across 110 nationalities, and includes 410 airports worldwide. Of course, it won't come as a surprise to most people because Changi is truly a phenomenal airport.

I love different things about India and different things about Singapore. And Changi is one of the top things I love about Singapore. The airport literally stands for what the rest of Singapore is.

I have loved Changi since I set foot on it almost 16 years ago. It was my first international flight, and I was coming here from a town so small that I had to take a bus, a train and a flight to land in Calcutta, from where I flew to Singapore. I was 18 and travelling by myself for the first time. I must have been in a state of trance because I felt no fear. But when I stepped out of the plane and into Changi airport, the song 'Yeh kahan aa gaye hum' played in my head. Very loudly. I simply gaped. My first impression of Changi was... "How freakin' clean is this place??"

My relationship with Changi airport grew stronger over the years as I passed through it to travel to about a dozen countries. And yet, every other airport I saw simply paled in comparison.

So here are the top seven reasons why I heart Changi airport.

The efficiency
Changi airport is the only airport I've been to where you can get off the plane and be in a cab ten minutes later. Even though it is one of the busiest airports in the world, catering to millions of passengers a year, the efficiency is amazing. It's crowded, yes, but the crowd moves along fast and in an orderly way. You'd be shocked at how long the taxi queues are, but you'd be even more shocked at how within minutes, a marshall is ushering you to your cab.

The cleanliness
As I said, the first thing that struck me about Changi was how impossibly clean it was. I was even sure that they dunked the free massage chairs in boiling water after every use. No seriously, the squeaky-clean floors shine like mirrors and everything is always bright and clean and shiny. Even the toilets. Even the toilets. When I first saw all this, it was almost blinding, especially to someone like me who had only seen Indian airports. (Though I'm told that some Indian airports are now very cool and clean and swanky, I hadn't seen any back then. Hopefully I'll make that much-desired trip to India soon; just waiting for the green light from Xena's doctors.)

The amenities
Singapore is such a tiny island that I'm always amazed at how much space and amenities Changi has. Other than the usual amenities such as hotels with pools and gyms, there are indoor playgrounds, arcade games, a butterfly garden, an orchid garden, a koi pond, spas, including a fish pedicure spa (yikes, but wow), art installations, a four-storey tall slide, and an aviation gallery.

The free stuff
Who doesn't love free stuff? And Changi sure has plenty of it. Free two-hour city tours for passengers on long transit, free foot massages, free wifi, free phones, and even free movie theatres!

The food
I think there must be at least a hundred dining places (maybe more) in Changi. From local food to international cuisines. From hawker style to fine dining. The free skytrain makes it so easy to travel from terminal to terminal, you can eat any kind of cuisine you crave. In fact, a lot of people go to the airport just to eat.

The hangout place
When I was studying at NTU (it's on the other end of the island from Changi), some of my crazy friends used to take the train all the way to Changi to study for their exams. Seriously. I never tried that though. It was a bit too much for me. I know people who take their kids to Changi and just let them run around and blow off steam. Airplane buffs can watch planes take off and land barely four metres away from the Terminal 1 viewing gallery. I'd have never thought of an airport as a hangout place till I saw Changi.

The welcome
Every time I'm flying back from somewhere, the immigration staff always smile and say, "Welcome home." And somehow, it does feel like home when I touchdown at Changi. It's always sad when a holiday ends, but when it ends through Changi, I feel like some of the pain goes away. Believe me. So all you bewdas who are planning your next holiday, don't think. Just come. And look me up.

Okay, I have finally come to the end of my government-sponsored publicity post. Thank you for reading and wish you a pleasant experience at Changi.

On a serious note, you can tell that I really do love it.

Changa hai Changi. :)

B is for Barbie

Prescript: I just had this crazy thought that I could have pulled out my bailout card by posting 'A for April Fool Banaya!' yesterday and gotten away with it. Tchah! Too late.

While I'm on the subject of the gifts Xena received on her birthday this year, I have to share my absolute delight when she unwrapped a box with a Barbie doll inside! Her first Barbie! I was a little disappointed though because after she had examined it, she simply tossed it aside and started playing with her other toys. "It's a Barbie, Xena!" I exclaimed. "You don't want to play with a Barbie?" She didn't. Sigh. Not that I was trying to make her all girly or anything, it was just that I have the most wonderful memories of my own Barbie dolls when I was a kid, and I thought that was something I'd share with Xena.

My first Barbie was such a big deal. Back then, they were one of the most expensive dolls in the market and none of my friends had one. My mom gave me my first Barbie for my 6th or 7th birthday. The doll was literally called 'My first Barbie'. I was amazed at everything about her. She had shiny hair that could be combed and styled, she had stylish clothes and amazing heels that could be taken off and put on. Years later, I read the articles on how the impossible proportions of Barbie dolls can lead to body image issues in little girls. Wow. I guess I never had that problem because I never wanted to be like Barbie; I just wanted to own her and play with her.

The only thing about her body that bothered me a bit was that she was always on tip-toes and couldn't really stand without support. But she was my first Barbie and I adored her. When my friends heard (i.e. I called each one of them and told them), they thronged my house to see her. You know how girls name their dolls? Whenever someone would ask me what my Barbie's name was, I'd be very offended. She was Barbie. What do you mean what is Barbie's name?

Over the years, the obsession just kept growing. I emptied out the entire bottom shelf of my cupboard and set up a complete doll house for her. I used to shampoo, condition (I kid you not!) and style her hair in different ways. (My mom-in-law tells me she's very impressed with my ability to make a neat French braid on my own hair; this is totally because of the years of practice I had on my Barbie's hair.) My mom, who was a pro at the sewing machine, sewed very pretty lehenga cholis and even sarees with golden borders for her! That was also how I learnt how to wrap a saree. I used to remove the thin white rings from the top of old desk calendars, cut and colour them to make spiral bangles to match each of her Indian outfits. I'd also put matching bindis on her.

I shared Barbie and the other dolls with my sister, but once teenage hit her, she stopped playing with dolls. She busied herself with the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew and I had the dollhouse and the contents all to myself!

At some point, I almost had a gudiya ki shaadi for her, but I did a 'Yeh shaadi nahin ho sakti!' when my friend who had the gudda implied that Barbie would have to move to her sasural after the wedding. Nice try, sister. Hmmmph!

I believe I got a few more Barbie dolls over the years but I don't remember much of the others. I only remember my first Barbie and how very very special she was to me.

And that's why I was a little disappointed when Xena didn't take to hers the way I'd taken to mine. But that changed a few days later. I was in the kitchen and she was playing in the living room with her other toys. Suddenly I heard a loud, "Oh no!" from her. "What happened?" I asked. "Barbie needs to poop now!" She said, sounding very distraught. I laughed out loud and went back to whatever I was doing. Suddenly, there was complete silence for a few minutes. Curious, I came out to see what was happening. THIS was happening. Barbie's clothes were off and she was on a 'toilet', apparently pooping.

My joy knew no bounds. Though it was a very unglamorous start, Xena was playing with her Barbie doll! After my laughter at Barbie's state had subsided, I sat down with Xena.

Two can play this game, I think?

A is for Abracadabra

Among the birthday gifts that Xena received this year was a Hello Kitty magic set. She was really excited to see Hello Kitty on the cover and took off with one of the figurines inside, showing no further interest in the set. I, on the other hand, was fascinated. Most of the tricks were indeed a little high-level for preschoolers, but there was a colour-changing trick scarf which was really easy to carry out, and something that can easily fool this age group. I did the trick for Xena and she was thrilled! And that gave me an idea. From time to time, Xena's school has story-telling sessions by parents and I'd wanted to do one this week. But then I decided to take it to the next level and perform some magic tricks instead. When I emailed her teacher to ask if I could do that (I promised her there would be no fire or explosions in the classroom!). She was more than happy to have me come and do something different from what the kids had seen so far.

So I turned to Google devta once again and got cracking. I needed some tricks which did not need much in terms of set-up, could be easily performed in a small space where the audience is literally inches from you, and was something 3-year-olds could relate to and enjoy. I prepared four tricks and rehearsed them 1828276337399302 times with Xena until she was sick of them.

I washed my hair the previous night and did not condition it so I'd have lots of static electricity for my balloon trick. I took an inflated balloon in my bag but took some spare balloons and a pump along, just in case the inflated one burst in my bag. (I also imagined the scenario in which I was in a crowded bus and suddenly something inside my bag went 'KABOOM!')

To be very honest, I was actually nervous. And that surprised me because I'd have thought that after years of doing corporate presentations, this should be nothing. Though I knew that it was just a bunch of 3-year-olds who wouldn't demand a money-back guarantee if a trick didn't work, I still felt like I was going for an important exam. Xena was going to be there and I had to make her proud in front of her classmates. She had already seen the tricks enough times to not be impressed by them anymore, but what she had not seen what how her friends and teachers would take to her mommy's stunts.

I reached at 10 am sharp, the time given to me. The teachers welcomed me warmly and asked me to sit outside while they 'prepared the class'. Prepared the class? *Gulp* I was asked to go inside a few minutes later. There was a small chair for me (My first thought was "OMG no table! How would my monkey trick work??") and the class was seated on a rug in front of me, looking at me with eager eyes. I looked out for yawning kid. I'm not kidding -- there's a poor kid in her class who's yawning in at least one class photo every day. (The teachers take daily photos of the class activities and upload them for parents to see.) All kids look alert and active and happy, but this kid is consistent. He is most likely just very tired from the early starts, but the impression one got from looking at him in the photos was "Boring teacher boring teacher boring teacher!" I didn't want to be "Boring magician, boring magician, boring magician!"

To my relief, yawning kid looked alert and excited, and so did the others. Xena ran to me and wrapped herself around my legs, and I had to peel her off and tell her that Mommy was a cool magician today and that she had to sit with her friends.

So these are the tricks I had, and here's how it went.

1. Colour-changing scarf - This was my first trick because it needed no set-up at all, and could not go wrong at all. The rigged scarf was already in the Hello Kitty magic kit so all I needed to do it pull the hidden scarf out, giving the impression that the scarf had completely changed in colour. I tried to add some educational value by asking them to name the before and after colours. The kids were thrilled and some even clapped! (You can tell from the exclamation mark that I was not expecting any kind of applause whatsoever.)

2. Magic hollow tube - This was my favorite of the lot, and also something that Viv said can impress grown-ups too. You have a very obviously hollow tube and suddenly you take out a whole bunch of things from it. You can get the details of how to rig the tube here. The class was excited to see me magically produce a balloon, a leaf, a puppet, a long scarf and a strip of stickers from it. One of the kids even yelled out, "Can you take out a dinosaur?" *Gulp* The teachers somehow saved me from that one.

3. Balloon picking up paper strips - This one's a no-brainer, of course. You rub a balloon on your hair and first it picks up electrons off your hair and then it picks up strips of paper. I'd hoped for no rain so the air would be really dry, and luckily it didn't rain. (But I want rain NOW!) Some of the kids came forward to try it for themselves and were very happy with the results.

4. Monkey magnet trick - I'd meant to do this on a table so they'd not be able to see my hand with the magnet behind the screen. But there was no table. So I got down on the floor and used the chair as a table and did it. I put a monkey fridge magnet on the chair in front of a cardboard screen. Then I told the kids that the monkey was asleep and they needed to wake it up. "Wake up, monkey!" They yelled. I used the magnet the shake the monkey a little but did not allow it to stick to the cardboard. The children though excited at the shaking head, were perplexed that it was not waking up. Then I told them, "Oh! I think we have to say 'please'! They yelled out, "Monkey, please wake up!" Immediately the monkey jumped to the cardboard, sending one of the kids into uncontrollable giggles. A chain reaction started and soon everyone was giggling. I had to literally stop and wait for the laughter to subside. Then I asked the kids to ask the monkey to move up, move down and go round and round on the paper. It obeyed every time, but only when there was a 'please'. The I told them that the monkey was tired and it needed to go to sleep again. "Please go to sleep, monkey!" they yelled out. I pulled the magnet away and the monkey fell on the chair, rolled over and went to sleep, producing peals of laughter from the class.

I finally breathed. I had done the tricks and they were a hit. The children were laughing and clapping and the teachers were beaming. Her class teacher told me I'd set the bar too high for her to engage the kids anymore and I'd have to come back every month. So I decided to give her my magic tube and showed her how to use it. Xena had a proud look on her face. The class said a big "THANK YOU" and waved goodbye to me.

I believe it's time to update my resume.

To add: Part-time magician. (Not suitable for audiences above 3 years of age)

Challenge accepted! (Err... kind of)

So my sister-in-law sent me a message from India, "Are you doing the A to Z blogging challenge?"

So I asked her what any extremely blog-savvy person who has been blogging for over a decade would ask, "What on earth is the A to Z blogging challenge??"

And it was then that she went off radar, leaving my question hanging. I found out later that she had dropped her phone and killed it her phone had fallen and died. I waited for a while but nothing happened. There was complete silence from her end. I waited for a very very long time and when five whole minutes had passed, I couldn't take it any more. I turned to Google devta. It turns out that if you take up the A to Z blogging challenge, you need to write 26 blog posts in the month of April, with topics based on the letters of the alphabet in sequence. So, on the 1st of April, you write a post about something that begins with the letter A, on the 2nd you write about something that begins with B and so on.

I think I have gone completely bonkers because I have decided to do it. In spite of the fact that: 1) I only found out about it a day before, which means I've had no time to think of topics and perhaps even cheat prepare a repository beforehand; 2) I'm a mother, which means my computer time is super unpredictable; 3) Viv is going to the US for two weeks so I'll be taking care of Xena all by myself FOR TWO WEEKS and I'm not sure I'll remain sane enough to blog; and the most terrifying of the lot, 4) holy cow 26 posts in a month.

So who's up for it? You can actually register for the challenge formally, which means a bunch of people will come check on you. *gulp*

Or you can do it like how I'm doing it (with the bailout option) - chal try maarte hain yaar. :)

My joyful joey

Apparently I'm the mama kangaroo and she's the joey (or 'doey' as she likes to say) who wants to sit in my pocket. Though I think it's the 'doey' who's got mama kangaroo in her pocket. :)

Three! (And still TV-free)

Avid followers of this blog (I reckon that would be about two or three... including family) would have noticed that I had disappeared for the whole of March before the last post (which, frankly speaking, was a video and hence, involved no real effort). Well, I was planning the big party. Xena turned THREE on 17 March, and only parents of 3-year-olds would know what a big deal that is. Around their third birthday, they are actually aware of what a birthday is, what a birthday party is, and want to be actively involved in the planning of the party ("I want a Tweety cake! No... I want a Hello Kitty cake! No... a Minnie Mouse cake!"). Her second birthday had been a disaster as it marked the beginning of her frequent hospitalisations. (She'd not been well so we'd just had a small gathering of about 12 at home. Just family and close friends. She cut her Nemo cake. Everyone wished her. We had food. She opened her presents. She was happy. And then she was hospitalised with severe bronchiolitis.)

And from then on, we were regulars at the hospital for the whole of 2013. In December last year, she was warded for a week just before Christmas. However, the one good thing that happened was that she underwent a bronchoscopy, while helped to clear her lungs, and surprisingly she did not have any of her episodes for all of January and February. Full attendance at school and all that. So there was this little lingering hope in my heart that perhaps this year would change things and that she could have the kind of grand third birthday party that she wanted. So we booked a restaurant, invited 75 people, ordered a gigantic Tweety cake (I told her she could have the Hello Kitty cake to cut at school, but there was to be no Minnie Mouse cake), wrapped 30 door gifts for the kids, blew 30 balloons the night before and were all set for the party on Sunday. Of course, the lovely haze decided to arrive (right after two months of drought -- a record for Singapore) and since she's in the high-risk group, I was constantly monitoring her blood oxygen level (I have a pulse oximeter at home). Thankfully, all was well.

The night before the party, she went to bed and was breathing comfortably. Viv was out getting dinner and I was working at my desk in the other room. However, I couldn't get rid of a nagging feeling and decided to check her blood oxygen level as she slept. To my utter shock, the oximeter showed 79. Anything below 95 indicates oxygen deprivation and I don't even want to go into the details of what severe oxygen deprivation can do to the brain. With my heart pounding wildly, I checked again and it was still hovering around 79-80. I gave her three puffs of Ventolin and started packing her hospital bag, when Viv got home. We decided to check again after some time to see if the Ventolin had made a difference, and have our dinner in the meantime. I realised I couldn't eat more than a spoonful. I just couldn't believe this was happening. The thing is that we're used to rushing her to hospital and seeing her warded, so that wasn't the big deal. The big deal was that this was happening again around her birthday. She had been so excited about her party and had been talking non-stop about it to anyone and everyone who cared to listen. The thought of her in hospital on yet another birthday, when she should be cutting her Tweety cake and having her grand party, was killing me. "This can't happen! Not now!" I screamed out. Viv had probably never seen me so agitated. He tried to calm me down, but I still couldn't get myself to eat. We checked her blood oxygen level again and it had risen only a little -- to about 83. So off we rushed to the Children's Emergency at KK hospital.

Saturday night is probably the worst night to go to the Emergency department because (1) all clinics are closed and (2) most children somehow seem to fall sick on weekend nights. Of course, the hospital was packed and there was even a sign saying that the average waiting time could be up to 2 hours. Barely three minutes from the time we entered the hospital, Xena was already on the oxygen mask. Once again, I salute KK hospital's efficiency.

By now, we recognise most of the doctors and nurses there, even though they are on rotation and not all are there all the time. Yes, that's the kind of KK frequent fliers we are. That's still okay. The sadder thing is that some of the doctors and nurses there recognise us! Sigh.

She was put on oxygen for about an hour, and also given some Prednisolone (it's a steroid that opens up your airways to help you breathe easier). The nurse said that Prednisolone was extremely bitter and asked me if she'd drink it from a cup or a syringe. We asked her to fill the syringe and hand it to Xena. The very surprised nurse did so, and as Viv and I smugly watched, Xena put the syringe in her mouth and pushed the plunger herself, not even flinching once. And then she thanked the nurse. These are the things that makes our frequent hospital visits so much more bearable. Seeing Xena take it all with so much grace and cheer, we have no reason to be otherwise. (Much later, I tasted a drop of her Prednisolone at home just to see if the nurse had exaggerated its bitterness. And... OMG waaak thooo!)

As we waited, we started thinking of what we'd need to do if she was indeed warded. Call up the guests to tell them the party was cancelled. Call up the restaurant to tell them we'll pay whatever the penalty for such a last-minute cancellation was. Call up the cake shop to tell them they could eat our lovely Tweety cake. No, I'm kidding! I was planning to get the cake to the hospital and have her cut it in her bed. And the good thing was that it was big enough to be shared by the entire ward, including the hospital staff, patients, and maybe even their relatives. You can see that I'd considerably calmed down and was quickly formulating the details of plan B. Of course, there was the lingering hope that for some reason, they'd let her go home latest by the morning and we'd still have the party.

And miraculously, her blood oxygen level elevated. They let her go home at 1 am. The party was supposed to start at 11:30 am. Viv excitedly started talking to her about it in the cab, when he noticed my death glare. "Nobody mentions birthday party," I growled. "Not till it actually happens."

So we got home and put her to bed. My stomach was protesting wildly by then, and I took out my refrigerated dinner which I felt I could stomach now. We got up early the next morning and started preparing. Everyone got dressed, decorations were packed, balloons tied together, Viv went to fetch the cake, and the entire time, no one said anything about a birthday party. It was hilarious on some levels.

And then, the rain came. After two months of dryness, there was rain. And it was not the gentle, pitter-patter kind of rain. It was the "I've finally arrived!" kind of rain. You could almost hear the collective cheer from the parched earth, the yellow grass, the thirsty trees, the dried up reservoirs, and the five million people of Singapore who had been waiting for two months. And then a dear friend sent me a text message, "Xena is indeed blessed. Her birthday has brought us rain."

And so, we had it all. The grand party. The 30 balloons. The birthday banner. The birthday dress. The 75 guests. The humongous Tweety cake. The butter chicken. The gobi manchurian. The gulab jamuns. The birthday wishes. The happy face of our happy little girl.

And though her blood oxygen level at the moment has gone down again to the borderline level and we're on standby to take her back to the hospital anytime, we're happy. She had her birthday party, you see, and that was our KPI for March.

At times I can't believe it. Xena is three. And yes, she's still TV-free. :)

The hunger games

Okay, this video is from December last year but somehow I missed uploading it here. Viv helped to add English subtitles to this one.

Here's my never hungry caterpillar, describing the very hungry caterpillar and expressing her utter disapproval at the fact that it was hungry again.

Trail(er)blazing

So I finally managed to catch up on all my trailer-watching of upcoming Hindi movies, and thought I'd share some that look promising. (No, Gunday is most definitely not part of it. I was put off by the trailer and the overacting that such good actors like Ranveer and Arjun had to do to make the movie more 'gundaydaar' I suppose. And I honestly cannot stand Priyanka Chopra anymore.)

Highway - I fell head over heels in love with Imtiaz Ali after watching Socha Na Tha, which is one of my favourite movies. Then came along Jab We Met and I bowed down to this genius again who actually made Kareena Kapoor likeable to humans. Though Jab We Met was a more 'put-together' movie, there is still something endearing in the raw, unpolished Socha Na Tha, and I still love it to bits. Then came along Love Aaj Kal and I shook my head in disbelief at what a bad movie it was. And then came along Rockstar and I nearly fell off my chair, wondering what had happened to my genius. Then came along Cocktail, which he wrote but did not direct. Another terrible movie. I have to admit I had lost all faith in him till I saw the trailer of Highway. One, the unusual pairing of Randeep Hooda and Alia Bhatt caught my eye, just as Abhay Deol and Ayesha Takia in Socha Na Tha had. Two, I really do like both of them as actors. I have watched the trailer countless times and they really do seem to have gotten under the skin of their respective characters. The music is quite catchy too, and I have been playing it for Xena a lot. Now Viv also knows the songs, but the other day he did ask me a very strange question. "What does she mean 'Tu kuja, mann kuja?'", he asked. "Is the song about scratching?" "Yes," I said, "The song is about scratching. She's asking him to scratch himself and his brain to get an idea." OMG I think he believed me. He just stood there and looked at me, trying to process the nonsense I'd just spouted. Anyway, if you're really interested, 'Tu kuja, mann kuja' is Persian for 'Tu kahan, main kahan' and the song is rather interesting because the lyrics quickly jump from Persian to Hindi to Sanskrit. Another song to look out for is Sooha saaha, where Alia sings a bit. (Did you catch her on Koffee with Karan, where Karan asked her to sing a song and she sang 'Om jai jagdish harey'?? That was hilarious, but she sang really well.) She sounds a bit nasal in Sooha saha, but it's a nice song overall. I really really hope that this movie is at the very least like Socha Na Tha or Jab We Met, if not better. Watch the trailer here.

Queen - I have never been a huge fan of Kangana, but lately she's got me hooked. Did you catch this interview of hers with Anupama Chopra? Truly one of the best Bollywood interviews ever. It's blunt, it's funny, it's warm and it's the truth. And then I saw the trailer of Queen. It seems like an out and out Kangana movie, with Rajkummar Rao thrown in because no other hero would probably want a role in a movie titled 'Queen' with Kangana stealing everyone's thunder. What's with this Rajkummar Rao fella? I always thought he was a sensible guy and quite liked him in everything he's acted in, but the day I read that he's gone and changed his name from Rajkumar Yadav to Rajkummar Rao, I stopped liking him. (Yes, I judge that hard sometimes.) Did he think he'd be mistaken for one of Laloo's 737374648 kids, or did he just want to offend all Biharis (and pseudo-Biharis like me)? He says 'Yadav' is the same as 'Rao' in Haryana. Say what?! And the extra m in his first name just makes me want to scream M for murder! Anyway, enough about him. Watch the Queen trailer here.

Total Siyapaa - Ali Zafar is cute. Ali Zafar can act. Ali Zafar can sing. Yami Gautam is cute. Yami Gautam can act. And I for one am still not tired of Kirron Kher playing the punjabi mummyji for the 838273656732892th time. I'm looking forward to this realistic version of Veer-Zara, and hope it doesn't dash my hopes. I have loved Ali Zafar from the time I saw Tere Bin Laden (if you've not watched it, OMG.) and though I found Mere Brother Ki Dulhan very blah, London, Paris, New York was interesting. Watch the Total Siyapaa trailer here.

Shaadi Ke Side Effects - I'm not so sure about this one, but I sure did enjoy Pyaar ke side effects and the sequel surely has better actors. (Okay, that's three times I've used 'sure' in a sentence.) Recently, I made Viv watch it on YouTube (there's a very good print available here; we actually played it on AppleTV.) and we just laughed and laughed and laughed thorough the movie. In spite of Mallika Sherawat. My favourite dialogue from the movie was the bartender's "Excuse me, sir, ma'am has fallen down." I really really hope that the sequel is at least as funny as the prequel, if not funnier. The trailer is very relatable, especially for new parents who really don't know why their baby wouldn't stop crying, or whether a tauliya really has an ulta side. But I loved Vidya Balan's "Main chahti hoon ki tum chaho ki tum na jao." which is what "Tum jana chahte ho toh jao." really means. Really. Watch the trailer here.

And here are those that didn't make the cut - Gulaab Gang (despite the explosive combination of Juhi and Madhuri together, it didn't interest me; I'm sure it will be hit though... or at least critically acclaimed), Dhishkiyaoon (OMG yes, there's a movie by this name and it's Harman Baweja's comeback movie. SSSK is already jumping and down after her last encounter with him.), Youngistan (Jackky Bhagnani returns... as Rahul Gandhi! Uhhh... Though Neil Bhoopalam killed it as a young PM-to-be in 24, Jackky, like his name, just seems silly.), and Main tera hero (I like Varun Dhawan, but this movie just looks plain bad. And to top it, they took Nargis Fakhri Ugh.)

Party pooper

So SSSK has somehow snagged an invitation to the Jai Ho success party. Her eyes are darting sharply from person to person until she spots the Khan-daan. A depressed Salman is drinking in a corner. Sohail and Arbaaz are giving him company. Malaika is standing next to them, looking annoyed.

SSSK - Hi, everyone. I'm SSSK, reporter for the Akh-bar.
Everyone (down and low) - Hiiii....
SSSK - Oh dear, what happened??
Arbaaz - We're mourning the failure of Jai Ho.
SSSK - Failure?? But this is the movie's success party!
Salman (gulps down his drink) - Arre koi samjhaao isko. Success party dete hain toh movie successful hoti hai.
SSSK - I thought movie successful hoti hai toh success party dete hain.
Salman - Sigh. Kis zamaane ki movie reporter ho yaar?
SSSK - But the movie crossed the 100-crore mark. Why would you call it a failure?
Salman - Because, you dhakkan, it did not make 100 crores in the first week. A Salman Khan movie that does not make 100 crores in the first week is a BIG FAT FAILURE. Shah Rukh's Chennai Express was a big hit. Aamir's Dhoom 3 was a bigger hit. I thought I would be the winner of 'Khan banega crorepati'! *sniffles*
Sohail - Sorry, bhai. It's my fault. I should have stuck to the original title 'Mental.' 'Jai Ho' sounds too... Aamir Khan, nahin? All your movies that have single-word English titles are hits. Wanted, Ready, Bodyguard... 'Mental' would have been perfect. And it describes your movies perfectly.
Malaika (mutters under her breath) - Sigh... What a family my hubby has. One brother is senti, and the other is mental.
Arbaaz - Well, if you'd agreed to do another Munni number in Jai Ho, maybe it would have been a bigger hit!
Malaika - Achha?? Why me?? Go to Bebo na! Ask her to do another Fevicol number. Hmmmph!
Arbaaz - You're still mad about that??
Malaika - Hmmmmph!
Salman - Stop fighting, yaar. It's nobody's fault, just mine. I shouldn't have promoted it as a 'different' movie...
SSSK - That's true, Salman. No one wants to watch a 'different' Salman movie.
Salman - And you know what the biggest tragedy is?? It's not different! It is a typical Salman movie. *bangs head on table*
SSSK - It's ok, Salman. You still have lots of movies coming up...
Sohail - Actually the next one is called 'Kick'. Single-word English title! Yahooooo! Kick kick kick!
Salman (drunk and furious) - Come, let me give you one!

Sohail runs. On his heels is Salman. On his heels is Arbaaz. On his heels is Malaika.

SSSK walks around, and suddenly spots Katrina.
SSSK - Katrina! Hiiii!
Katrina - Errr... Hi... And you are?
SSSK - I'm SSSK. We've met before, remember? At the 'Firangiyon, Hindi Seekho' competition?
Katrina (proudly) - Oh yeah, I won that one.
SSSK - So how are things?
Katrina - Great. Doom was a big hit so... life's good.
SSSK (explodes) - Doom?? DOOM???? You won that competition, you've been in the Hindi film industry for more than a decade and you still can't pronounce "DHOOM"???
Katrina (gulps) - Uhhhhhh... Sorry... I know it's 'DOOM'. Better?
SSSK - Sigh... From Boom to Doom. Bollywood is doomed all right. How did they sign you when you can't even pronounce the name of the movie right??
Katrina (bursts into tears) - I begged them, okay?? I just wanted to get all three Khans on my resume before they... you know....
Uday Chopra walks over.
Uday - Katrina! any problem?
Katrina flees, sobbing. Uday looks at SSSK, puzzled.
SSSK - We were just talking about Dhoom 3.
Aditya Chopra and Rani Mukherjee walk over to defend their khandaan ka chirag.
SSSK - So Uday, is the Dhoom series all you do? Not getting any other offers, huh?
Uday - Uhh... Err... I'm getting tons of offers, okay? But I reject them all. I'm very focused, you see. I don't want to dilute the success of my Dhoom brand...
SSSK (bursts into hysterical laughter) - You think you stand for the success of the Dhoom brand??
Uday - Why, yes! Of course!
SSSK (to Rani Mukherji) - Didi... Tera devar deewana.

The Chopra clan leaves, seething.

SSSK spots Priyanka Chopra.
SSSK - Priyanka! How are you??
Priyanka - Who are you??
SSSK - Ummm... I'm SSSK, reporter for the Akh-bar. I have a few questions for you.
Priyanka - Errr okayyy...
SSSK - I listened to your album "I'm feeling so idiotic." It's nice.
Priyanka (coldly) - It's "I'm feeling so exotic."
SSSK - Oh yes yes, exotic! But I did want to ask you how "exotic" rhymes with "tropics".
Priyanka - ....
SSSK - I mean, I can think of so many words that would have rhymed better with "exotic".
Priyanka - Oh yeah?? Like??
SSSK - Neurotic, psychotic, idiotic, chaotic, robotic, narcotic, antibiotic...
Priyanka - Ok ok fine. Bas karo! Please.
SSSK - Ok, never mind. Let's talk about something else. What do you feel about your cousin sister Parineeti? Do you think she will surpass your success?
Priyanka bursts into tears. Karisma, who's standing nearby, nods her head sympathetically.
Karisma - I understand, Priyanka. Yeh chhoti behnen...
SSSK - Karisma! Just the person I was thinking of! What do you think of Virat Kohli?
Karisma - Virat Kohli?? Why??!!
SSSK - I think you should date him.
Karisma - *You* think I should date him?? Pray why??
SSSK - Then the circle of love will be complete.
Karisma - Circle of love?! Huh??
SSSK - See, the circle goes like this. Karisma has dated Abhishek who has dated Aishwarya who has dated Salman who has dated Katrina who has dated Ranbir who has dated Deepika who has dated Ranveer who has dated Anushka who has dated Virat Kohli. So if you date Virat Kohli, the circle would be complete!
Karisma (speechless for a moment) - Were you actually invited to this party??

SSSK storms off, deeply offended.

Bright and early

So last week I had an early-morning meeting for a potential project. Okay, the meeting was not really that early in the morning, but it was in a land far far away, also known as 'the other end of the island'. I had to get up at 6 am to make it. "So what?" I hear many of you say, "I get up at 5 am every day. Including weekends." I have only one thing to say to you guys. Please make a single file and leave the bar. Ok bye. Jokes aside, I am actually not a not-morning person. Ok, that sounded confusing. I mean, I am a morning person. I don't mind an early start to the day. But by early, I mean get-up-at-7-am kind of early, and not Akshay Kumar's 'If you want me on the Koffee couch, we'll need to shoot at 6 am.' statement to KJ. Anyway, let's get back to the original topic because if I get started on Koffee with Karan, shutting me up will take a few hours.

Since I started working from home, I have stopped setting a wake-up alarm, and started relying on a very different kind of alarm clock - Xena. She's up, we're up. Because there is no alternative. If she's up and we're not, she'll do three reps of TT (toddler tandav) accompanied by four verses of "Good morning ho gaya! Wake up ho jao!" till we wake up. And since she wakes up around 7ish every morning, it works well for me. I work till about 11 pm after she's gone to sleep and manage to get my 8 hours of duty sleep.

So when I had to set at alarm for 6 am for this meeting, it was a sudden and big deal. To get ready and leave the house before Xena and Viv even woke up felt strange. I left all sorts of post-its with tips for him to get her ready for school. (Usually he's in charge of brushing her teeth and shovelling breakfast down her unwilling throat, while I get her, her bag, her snackbox and our breakfast ready). The toughest job for him that morning must have been her hair. Her tropical rainforest hair, to be precise, inherited directly from her mommy. Anyway, I left father and daughter to deal with things and quietly made my way out.

It was a loooong 2-hour journey, involving two buses and a train, and since I don't own a smartphone (by choice), I had plenty of time to reflect and people-watch. Something that I usually don't get time for. And as I watched all the half-sleepy people around me, I was reminded of the time before Xena when I was also a part of this corporate crowd, getting up early, running after the bus in my high heels trying to get the driver's attention, rushing to work, trying to look alert and professional in a super-early-morning videoconference when there was little stopping me from doing an auto-headdesk.

Another phase of my life when I had to wake up really early was when I decided to do a part-time Master's degree in a university which was, again, on the other side of the island. Far away from my home and far away from my workplace. Great. This is what I had done to my life. And it was very very hard to survive on such little sleep. I think that was partly what made me finish it in the not-recommended-at-all three semesters. I just wanted to get it over and done with so I could finally catch some sleep.

The last phase I could think of when early starts were a prerequisite were my school days. 1996-1998 in particular, when my dad was transferred to a tiny place I can only refer to as not a city, not a town, but maybe a... settlement? The local schools ended at Std X. If you wanted to study more, you had to go to the neighbouring settlement. The school bus picked me up at 5:45 am, so I had to wake up at 5 am and get ready. Because if you missed that bus, you pretty much missed school. And this nerd LOVED school. I loved it so much that I can't even remember finding the 5 am wakings-up a torture. The thrill of school and meeting friends and impressing teachers overpowered everything else. But I have to give my dad credit here who had a very strict rule - lights out at 9 pm and no exceptions. And I think that's probably what made the waking up at 5 am easier. I hope I can apply his rule successfully to Xena when she grows up and protests at her current bedtime of 8:30 pm.

The bus ride to school used to be about 2 hours long, and it was fantastic. The bus was completely dilapidated, and it rattled and jumped for most of the trip. But my friends were in there, and my best friend (why don't we have those anymore?) who got on the bus before me used to save me a seat, and we used to play antakshari (till the fateful day when some of the guys in our class threw coins at us as a joke and we didn't talk to them for a week and they had to literally come and beg us not to do that). The bus used to go through a jungle, and there was even a tribal kid who used to board the bus from a tiny hut in the jungle. I realised I had very very happy memories of the morning bus ride, and I barely remembered the waking-up-at-5-am part.

So I started thinking - what is it that makes early starts during school days seem not so bad, but a real torture when we grow up? Is it because we screw up our lifestyles so bad as adults that whatever little sleep we get becomes our life-support, and when we don't get it, we snap? Is it because in the race for other things, the most important ones get sacrificed first -- sleep, water, breakfast, etc.?

Being adult is no fun. Almost all of us have more fun and fonder memories of our childhood than our adulthood. But does that hold true anymore? Even childhood these days doesn't seem as carefree and bindaas as it used to be. Singapore is a stressful place for kids once they start going to school proper. The first national level exams, the much-dreaded PSLE (Primary School Leaving Examination), are held when the kids are barely 12. And these exams will pretty much determine what they become in life. I think most of my childhood was spent up on a tree, and the first time I ever got serious about studies was for the Std X (O level) exams. That's when we were expected to stop being 'children' and 'grow up' and 'prove ourselves'. I try and imagine Xena as a 12-year-old studying seriously for the PSLE and it breaks my heart a little bit.

So here's my little wish for her. I hope she has as close a childhood to what I had, and even with the pressures and early starts, truly has a very very good time at school.