Manish Joseph

Chhat(छत) or rooftop terrace was such a wonderful use of land in Rajasthan and much of North India. Arguably even more in the 90s, when people didn't build multiple stories and the chhat was still an integral part of everyday life. More in the 90s, before washing machines and dryers became common, when clothes were dried under the sun. When the same sun was used to dry food, make achaars and papads. When sardi ke kambal, rajai aur kapde bhi pehli dhoop wahin khaate thhe. More in the 90s, when you were a kid who could run and jump across ten homes, playing with the kids in those homes, like moving through ten compartments of a sleeper-class train, apparently also a 90s thing. When you could talk to your neighbours for hours and come back only when mummy called you. More in the 90s, when you played cricket, cards and board games on the terrace. When you could fly kites, drench yourself in the first rain, or simply watch the clouds approaching, bringing rain like in Lagaan. More in the 90s, when you could talk ishaaron ishaaron mein, wave at someone, or do some nain matakka from ten homes away. When the entire mohalla was somehow connected through these chhats. More in the 90s, when you didn't have ACs, and cooler se bhi cool-cool breeze could help you sleep under the stars. When you could do some stargazing and find Saptarishi and yeh taara, woh taara, Dhruv taara. Of course, sometimes you had to run downstairs in the middle of the night when it started raining, or when hawa was no more there and machhar were busy kaating and drinking your blood. And then run upstairs again when it suddenly started raining, to bring in the clothes jo sookh chuke hain, or were still trying to. More in the 90s, when you could read a book under that little shade of the chhajja, with some morning sun on your legs and a gentle breeze. Or just sit there doing nothing, looking at the world around you. The chhat was a playground, bedroom, laundry room, food-drying station, reading room, neighbourhood meeting point, and even a little observatory. All on the same piece of land. And all changing with the seasons. And you could write a hundred books on sardi ki woh dopahri, aur chhat ke chhajje ke neeche baitha main, padh raha hoon kitaab, dooba hoon khayalon mein. उस छत पे सिर्फ़ काला कौवा नहीं बैठा है, वहाँ मैं भी हूँ, और सारे पुराने दोस्त यार भी है। Somehow, the chhat was where your home ended, but the whole mohalla, the sky and your imagination began.

Gauri Shinde has such amazing music sensibility, on top of her movie making skills. English Vinglish and Dear Zindagi are examples of brilliant musical teams. Such rich songs. Great lyrics. Amit Trivedi with Swanand Kirkire Amit Trivedi with Kausar Munir.

Uttam Singh is a genius at churning out melodies. Somehow, such usage of melody also reminds of Amitabh's legendary mouth organ in Sholay. Whistling is such a beautiful way to perform a tune, a melody. Somehow brings us closer to nature. Maybe it's the koyal's sound resemblance. Just a few notes of music, like this legendary Are Re Are, Yeh Kya Hua. Yet it carries so much sweetness and emotion. One of those rare occasions when a human becomes an instrument, almost a flute. Voice aakaar, humming or sargam can also carry a melody. And obviously, we have the violin, harmonium, piano, guitar which can do it. But a melodic whistle has a certain natural pleasantness of its own. And somehow, it feels so desi. Maybe because we love things that are natural and spontaneous. Maybe it's our love for the bansuri, the koyal, and melodies that don't need words to express themselves. Something more than words.

Gangubai Kathiawadi vibes. Utekar bane bhansali. Shraddha bani Alia. Saare characters aajkal arnab ki tarah cheekh cheekh ke apni baat kehna chahte hai, male ho ya female. Perhaps we have all been arnabified.

But kerala also has PoChetta

Vivaah movie ka jal lijiye feel bhi hai. Par baatcheet us waqt honi toh aise hi chahiye feel bhi. Authentic versus commercial ya global me hamesha friction ke chances hai.

Many of our art forms including stand up comedy did not have schools, examples and documented material enough. Raju excelled in manviyakaran or humanizing characters with north desi context. Ekdum thet bhi has denge. He was connected to masses then elites. His cows, train ka dabba, chapati and achar all are characters. We often considered maza aaya ki nahi as the primary factor, so comedy act often gets reduced to bandar nach. We generally enjoy and excel in the comedy when one person brings another person down, roast or insult comedy kinds, like what Kapil often does, and we do in dosti yaari. Raju rarely dived into that. His comedy was mostly genuine and very desi. He often created funny stories out of regular life. India did have older traditions of hasya kavi sammelans, mimicry in places like kerala, nukkad nautanki, and comic storytelling. So Raju wasn't inventing observational comedy from scratch. But still he was one of the firsts of his kinds, in tv stream popular ones, in so called stand up acts, atleast for millenials in hindi speaking heartland.

There are primarily 4 famous styles of pronouncing R, at least when we compare Hindi, Malayalam and English. 1. Simple or Tapped R (र/ര) The most common R for us. As in Hindi Ram, Malayalam Ravi, or even the American pronunciation of butter. The tongue quickly taps the roof of the mouth once. 2. English Approximant R As in Red, Right, Crore. The tongue slightly curls back without actually touching the roof. This is not a traditional R sound in Hindi or Malayalam. So crore becomes difficult for traditional desi speakers. 3. Rolled R (റ) As in Malayalam കറി (curry). The tongue vibrates repeatedly. Interestingly, Malayalam has both the simple ര and the stronger റ, something Hindi and English doesn't. However this becomes ultimate confusion for new learners. 4. Retroflex R (ഴ) The difficult one! As in Malayalam മഴ (mazha). The tongue curls backward with stiffness, but doesnt tapp or roll. Hindi doesn't have an exact equivalent, though it has a close relative in ड़, as interestingly in करोड़ (crore) or भीलवाड़ा. ड़ is a retroflex flap, where the curled tongue strikes once rather than smoothly flowing like Malayalam ഴ. Interestingly, crore itself becomes a nice example. English crore uses Type 2, while Hindi करोड़ uses Type 1 for र and a retroflex flap for ड़. Malayalam simply calls it കോടി, avoiding the whole R business! For Hindi speakers, moving from the regular र to the English R or Malayalam ഴ can take effort. I usually ask them to first try the English approximant R, or the rolled R, and then gradually work towards the Malayalam retroflex ഴ. Devnagri ड़ is actually a useful compromise because the tongue already knows how to curl backward. Hindi speakers aren't even consciously taught the retroflex sounds they already use, as a category, like ड़ or ण in निपुण, let alone the difference between all these similar but different sounds. Hindustani speakers often shy away from fully pronouncing the few retroflexes left, and even shy from pronounced vowels like ऐ or औ , eventually distancing themselves from sanskrit, while malayalam and south langauges phonetically may sound closer to sanskrit in everyday conversations.

Malayalam cinema and audience arguably celebrates a wider vocabulary of beauty & grace. Has variety of faces in male and female mainstream actors. Color doesnt matter that much too. Mohanlal and recently Nivin can even pull a paunch. Arguably less celebrated songs on gora/gori, sundar, chehra, rang, husn, mukhda compared to Hindustani. More usage of poetic beauty of nature or love as a metaphor, like in Malare. Like hindustani it doesnt have a separate word for Gora/Gori and manages with the white color word, velluthathu. Somehow malayalam cinema converges character actors and superstars into one category. Still doesnt tag female actors as superstar or in meaty roles consistently which could be a separate discussion. However desis as a society are/were traditionally stuck on color, and particular set of faces, oval or round. Pressure has always been more on females. Its only recently like Shobhita, Anoushka kind of faces have become celebrated. Once a person becomes famous, the voice, the face cut, the style, the name all become likeable. As we have witnessed with srk and amitabh. In real life, knowing the person adds to the likeability of features. Fame makes features familiar, and familiarity slowly converts features into beauty.

You can learn a foreign language but it is very difficult to learn local accent of that langauge. You can imitate that accent. You can try to mimic it. But if you start the learning process as an adult, then it is close to impossible. You can certainly learn local accent organically as a kid from the surroundings. Accent flavors exist in local shops, street side conversation, farmers market, in case of india when you talk to your chaiwala, local barber, shopkeeper, tailor, milkman, postman etc, and as a kid with your local friends. When you interact with them everyday, you grow as a child there, you catch that accent. Its difficult to document accent as it is a style of saying certain words, its a choice of selective vocab, sometimes limited to a locality and community. Its not just pronunciation, it has rhythm and musicality & an unconscious spontaneity. You can learn all grammar and vocab, but if you dont have local rhythm, and the exact words to be said in a social context, you get revealed. You also need to know local culture of movies, music, sports, food and popular entertainment to be a complete pro in local flavors. It all boils down to belonging. Local acccent often comes last in equation of learning a language however that is what makes you belong to a culture. And arguably it needs a certain acting skills if learnt late as adults. Typically you may know multiple languages but only one local accent, well pakka local, well where your roots are or were. Often that reveals your first language.

Arey pyaar se bulaate hai jo bhi bulaate hai. Jaise Sonu Monu aur Bunty Babli ko unko kareeb se jaane waale. Rishte pe nirbhar karta hai naam. Especially jab bachpan se jaante ho ek dusre ko. Multiple names of a famous city often shows that it has a rich history, rich welcoming culture & diversity of people. Not many famous cities can claim that.

Rang & Rangeela Rahman Some words become culturally more frequent. One such word is Hindustani Rang, which means color. Interestingly every language have different set of star words or favorite words, which are used more in conversations, more in poetry and popular culture and music, because they sound easy to ears, because they rhyme well. In hindustani poetry rhyming and sound of word often matters as influenced by urdu, so we choose and decorate with tameez and mehnat. And the effect goes both ways in a loop, rang is used more frequently in poetry, also out of the love for colors and colorful life, eventually adding even more colors to culture and hindustani life. While Hindustani word Rang reminds of Holi and festivity, it can add colors to every aspect of life. Recently got reminded of Rang in Mangal Rang song of Ramayan. If we take Rahman songs example with colors, we may find many colourful gems. Well in the starting of his career itself he got Rangeela, the colorful tag and later we celebrated Rang De Basanti. His songs have the morning fresh 'Shyam Rang bhar do' from movie Water. Sukhi loves colors & titli and saare jahan ki rangat with Rahman into his mutthi. Meenaxi has the experimental calming Rang Hai Rang Hai with Tabu ya takshak with sukhi and asha's Mujhe Rang De. Rangreza the one who colors you, takes an entry in Kun Faya Kun and the global song with Rushil Ranjan. Rang de basanti is such a lovely Daler song as well as in the everflowing patriotism of Mera Rang de basanti chola song. Or gulzar's Tu hi Tu Satrangi re or actual color name like Peeli Dhoop. Or Mehra and Prasoon ka kaala bandar.