High Rated Gabru Gonna Save You

Eight months into 2020, I’m happy to announce that I’ve already achieved my year-end goal which was ‘Eat Own Weight In Wasabi Peas’. In other achievements, I’m also learning, for the first time ever, what it’s like to live and feel truly and properly alone. And unlike my beard which now covers 300 square miles and has its own zip code, this isn’t something I can blame on the pandemic. Nope, the truth is that loneliness waltzed in through the doors a few years ago and just stuck around; a haemorrhoid of the soul.

You’re probably thinking, “Ashish, you? Lonely? How?! You’re the guy famous for yacht parties with supermodels bursting out of walls like that thing from Alien.” Actually that’s DiCaprio, but it’s a common mix-up. And yes, it is odd, because I always saw loneliness as a feeling reserved for other people, like senior citizens or Imtiaz Ali heroes looking for women to save them. But hey, like love and FIRs, loneliness happens when you least expect it.

It wasn’t always this way. Let’s flashback to a time way before Covid, when you could hug people minus the mental image of going to third base with a ventilator. I’d moved in to a new place, with a friend I’d known for years and a metabolism that was happy to finance half of Bombay’s liquor industry. But eventually my 30s heard the ruckus and called the cops on that party. Then came solo living, where I found myself walking into the jaws of an empty, silent flat every night, which was exactly what I wanted. Except when I didn’t. And both those feelings existed at the same time.

The last couple of years also became kinda work-from-home, or sometimes ‘work from cafe and pay 700 bucks for cardboard dandruff aka granola’. So I’d often go days without having spoken to anyone, except maybe my trainer. And a dude reciting numbers while you throw up a lung on the gym floor hardly counts as social interaction.

Given all this practice, at the start of the pandemic, I found myself handling the isolation aspect a little bit better than I expected. Don’t get me wrong – I still hated it. I’m not one of those internet-introverts whose entire personality is telling the world that they’re introverts. BUUUUTTT <guy tapping forehead meme.jpg> you can’t be sad about isolation if you’re busy being sad about other everyday concerns like overarching doom, the complete upheaval of life as you knew it, and that icky feeling of wet atta stuck to your fingers.

And now, after five months of not meeting people, I’m relatively okay and haven’t invented imaginary friends haha Ashish is lying this is Pramod his new close friend and also pillow.

It isn’t just me. Over the last few years, urban loneliness has been recognised as a global health issue. I know this because googling ‘urban loneliness’ is a thing you do when you’re lonely. Fun Fact: in 2018, Britain created a position called Minister of Loneliness. Yes, there’s an actual person and no, their job is not to share Artidote all day. (They share nihilistic TikToks.)

In India, like the west, loneliness has started leap-frogging age barriers and hitting young urban professionals. It’s a crippling affliction that sometimes causes them to take desperate measures, like suicide or arranged marriage.

Thankfully neither of those are on the cards for me, but even pre-Covid, I found myself entertained by completely unnecessary thoughts. For example, what if I choked to death or slipped and hit my head in the bathroom during a rained-in weekend? How long before someone found out? I’d like to think soon but that’d only happen if there were some client deliverables pending. That would be weird:

Client: Why is the content delayed? We put a date in the Excel HOW DARE YOU DISRESPECT THE DOT XLS.

Manager: Uh, Ashish died.

Client: Oh no… we’ll have to (gasp) update the promo posters.

Manager: Wtf.

Client: RIP EXCEL SHEET. GONE TOO SOON. <sobs into pivot table>

You’d think that the solution would be to surround yourself with people and yes, friends are lifesavers, but not the complete answer. For one, they do this weird thing where they exist as individuals with their own needs and desires and schedules, so they may have to pass up the glorious opportunity to babysit your lonely ass.

And secondly, even if you pack your calendar with socialising, it’s a temporary fix. You can’t use people as pacifiers forever. The trick is to be at peace by yourself, without compulsively clutching onto a deadline or a drink or a joint or a screen or six break-ups worth of ice-cream. As far as I know, the only person to have achieved this is the Buddha. It probably helped that there was no internet back then. You can’t achieve enlightenment when you’re refreshing Insta 20 times a minute just to see some asshole boomerang his drink. (It’s me, I’m that asshole.)

I’ve also realized that I’ll never get completely used to the silence that comes from living alone. It feels like your whole house is wearing noise-cancelling headphones. You need active measures to dispel it otherwise you run the risk of turning into an art-film character, communicating entirely through sighs and kurta-creases.

One pick-me-up technique is to go about your chores with loud music on, even if you don’t feel like it at the start. Trust me, by the end of it, your neighbours will hate you. I’m sure mine think that I’m a psychopath because who listens to Run The Jewels, Taylor Swift and High Rated Gabru in the same hour? But hey, they’re the ones with two ear-shattering kids they made on purpose, so who’s the real psychopath huh huh?

Although it’s no guarantee, I’m told that it gets better in the case of healthy, stable relationships. I wouldn’t know – there are thinkpieces longer than my longest relationships. Sometimes I’m reminded of this right when I wake up and see that the bedsheet on my side is wrinkled, while the other half is pristine and untouched. If you look at the bed from directly above, you can see exactly where hope ends and the Prateek Kuhad video begins.

If you’re in a similar boat and were expecting real solutions in this piece then yay, you’re already a foolish optimist and you’ll be fine. Because really, what other approach could there be except dogged optimism and all that other boring but important stuff like therapy, exercise, cutting down on social media, pushing yourself to forge real connections, cuddling with Pramod etc. I wish you luck, especially for the days where nothing works and you only want to Netflix and eat rubbish. Just avoid wasabi peas. They’re really easy to choke on.

A Mostly Unhelpful Guide To Modern Dating

I like to think that I’m up to date with modern culture. For example, just today I found out what a Billie Eilish is: a device that mumbles so that 12-year-olds can feel something. But recently a friend mentioned the term ‘Dracula-ing’ in the context of modern dating, and I was clueless. My first thought was, “Is that a fetish where you get turned on by the sight of your lover in a coffin?” but nope, that’s just called divorce.

No, ‘Dracula-ing’, according to this young, forever-tormented generation, is when a romantic interest / future-therapy-topic surfaces only at odd hours of the night to text you the classic ‘hey u up?’. This text is seen as disrespectful to the English language and also to people who do not want to be treated like Orgasm Vending Machines.

There are other terms that I’ve learned recently: Zombie-ing, which is when a hook-up who had ghosted you ages ago, re-appears with no explanation or apology, asking to be let into your pants. There’s also ‘V-lationshipping’, which is when a long-lost ex contacts you around Valentine’s Day to see if they can cut open your chest and fill it up with excuses again.

There are a million such dating terms, because coining names is easy and adds a nice blanket of humour over the festering roadkill that is your love life. But in all our hand-wringing about modern dating, we sometimes forget a few basics.

First of all, we wanted this. We wanted to defy tradition and have the freedom to pick our next drinking problem. Even when we didn’t have the technology to simultaneously sext three people while taking a dump, we knew we wanted choice and that’s the weird thing about choice – it turns out that other people have it too. Someone could be your main window and you’d just be one of fifteen open tabs or vice-versa, and that’s just how it is, according to this browser analogy that I feel we should now minimise to avoid shitty puns.

And sure, tech is an enabler, but the core behaviours aren’t really new. Previous generations just called them ‘Trust And Communication Issues’ (and then went out and got scurvy or whatever they did for fun back then, I dunno.)

My favourite manifestation of these issues are the ‘No Label’ relationships. They sound great on paper, except you dig in a little (two drinks) and realise that one person would actually like a label but can’t really ask because the other person will leave and then nobody will ever love them and they’ll die alone and all their exes will turn up at the funeral to sneer and laugh and swap stories about their weird birthmark shaped like Rajpal Yadav.

Look, it’s not inherently cooler to have “no labels”. Being “Undefined” is also technically a label. And what are the rules? Are you allowed to hook up with other people? Will you meet each others’ friends? Do you go dutch on the abortion bill or is it like drinks – ‘I’ll get this one, you get the next’? Because it doesn’t matter what you call yourself – ‘Friends With Benefits’, ‘No Labels’, ‘Poly But Upvaas On Thursday’ – if you haven’t discussed the rules, then one of you will spend several nights sobbing along to the sad sounds of Kumar Sanu’s nose. (Spoiler Alert: It’s probably you.)

So is there a bright side to this nonsense or are we all doomed to spend our lives chugging from the Fountain Of Perennial Disappointment? Of course there is. This churn is good, because every Dracula, every Zombie, every Goblin (that’s when you date a tiny magic banker who’s a dog-whistle for the Jewish community) – every one of these encountered is a bad option eliminated, paving the way for better ones to come along and meet a smarter you. (OR you’ll just build an emotional Great Wall Of China and push away anyone who tries to get close, but hey, save that worry for the 2 a.m. internal monologue.)

In my personal experience, it does get better with time simply because you get better with time. I remember how frantic and hyper we used to get in our 20s, and how much garbage we would tolerate. We’ve all been on both sides of conversations like this:

Friend: Woe is me, why do I keep dating shitty dudes, why why why? This one keeps yelling his ex’s name during sex.

Me: Dump him.

Friend: Nooo, maybe it’s an honest mistake?? ‘Cos her name is so similar to mine?

Me: Is her name also Pooja?

Friend: Close. It’s Eyehfuwjjføjasihkhfhghyykshjull.

Me: …

Friend: She’s named after that Icelandic volcano.

Me: So you gonna ignore my advice now or later?

Friend: Never mind, marrying him tomorrow!

Things improved only once we discovered this wonder drug called self-esteem. Oh man, you try it once, you never wanna go back. Sure, it’s not the easiest to manufacture, although society deals it to you quicker if you’re a dude. But take one hit and suddenly you’re doing things like “being confident” and “setting boundaries” and “not settling for bullshit behavior just because they have a nice butt that fills the parent-shaped hole in your heart.”

Don’t get me wrong – I’m still extremely single and my last intimate encounter was with a packet of Peppy Chips. But now there’s a certain equanimity about the situation, which helps tackle the biggest dating fear of them all i.e. settling down with someone only because you’ve hit a certain age and not because you feel, in every atom of your body, that this is the person whose adult diapers you would hate changing the least.

I know modern dating is way more complicated than before but we also have more freedom than anyone’s ever had. If we use it well and keep our spirits and standards high, then maybe one day it’ll work out. Yes, I know that statement makes no objective sense but neither does the assertion that ‘It’ll never work out’. Both are equally baseless from a logic perspective so why not latch on to the nicer thought? The thought that maybe one day, the universe will notice and it will give in and whisper in our direction those powerful magic words, ‘hey u up?’.

In Loving Memory Of Common Sense

This is a very difficult column to write because I keep having to extricate my palm from my face as I type. It’s not like this is a rare occurrence — our wonderful countrymen are known for their unyielding devotion to the Kingdom of Daft – but this week has been particularly fruitful on that front. If common sense were a person, this is the week in which he would’ve been spat upon, fired and dumped for a dude who has ebola.

It started in Kerala, aka God’s own nurse factory. Last week, a bunch of gentlemen from the BJP youth wing reportedly vandalised a cafe in Kozhikhode (pronounced ‘Pilavullakandi Thekkeparambil Usha’). They did this despite the fact that it wasn’t a CCD outlet.

They claimed that the place was home to “immoral activities”, which is code for ‘Achche Din Aane Waale Hain’. I’m not sure what these activities were, but it probably involved some extremely obscene behaviour by boys and girls, like existing in the same physical space.

(Interestingly, the “immoral activties” were “exposed” by a Congress-owned channel a few days before the attack. It’s nice to see the two parties put their differences aside for real issues like these.)

In protest, a bunch of people in Kochi came up with a Kiss Of Love campaign, because for maximum efficiency, a campaign must be named after a Bobby Deol song from Jhoom Barabar Jhoom. They declared 2nd November as Kiss Day, inviting everyone who is not a cretin to gather at one place and kiss and celebrate love and possibly get lathi-charged. I quite like the idea of the protest. I stand by the people behind it, mostly because I don’t have to go out there and do it. What can I say? I’m just not a big fan of getting water-cannoned, because that would ruin my phone.

At the time of going to print, the police had denied permission to the organisers, probably because this wasn’t a political rally or a festival procession full of drunken oversexed gorillas holding up traffic.

Things reached a point where two people petitioned the Kerala High Court to stop the Kiss Mafia. The court shot down the petitions on grounds of free speech, because it is not proper for judges to say “Aage badho, chhutta nahin hai.”

On a brighter note, the BJP state vice-president said that his party would not interfere with Kiss Day, and that moral policing and violent protests were “not BJP’s cup of tea”. Overcome with emotion at such honesty, Kim Jong-Un broke down and said that insanity and crap haircuts were also not his cup of tea. Then he shot the guy standing closest to him.

It’s weird to see that India still hasn’t come to terms with PDA, still choosing to refer to it by its technical name, Chumma Chaati.  I, for one, am in awe of these brave, hormonally charged souls because it takes great talent to be perched on a bike on a busy seaface next to a hundred other bikes, watching out for cops and goons while your fingers wrestle with a bra clasp, racing to vanquish it before you collapse from monoxide poisoning.

But I get why innocent civilians get thrashed for kissing. Think about this way: you’re a ticket to a political hoodlum’s promotion. For them, assaulting civilians is a great way to get noticed and show their superiors that they possess the excrement gene needed to be a neta. I wish things were as easy for the rest of us, but it doesn’t work that way in the our world. I wish we could use excuses like that in office:

Boss: You’re lazy, irresponsible and you’ve missed your sales target by 273%. You’re fired.

You: Wait, I just punched a girl for wearing shorts.

Boss: Ohkay…

You: She was ten.

Boss: What colour do you want your private jet to be?

I can’t wait for the moral police to take this anti-kissing drive to the next level and bring in a communal angle to it. Before you know it, they’ll have you believe that Tongue Jihad is a real thing, and that our culture is being threatened by Lashkar-e-Lips. Thankfully, there are people standing up to this nonsense. I hope the Kochi protest goes off peacefully and that much love and saliva is exchanged, because otherwise I would’ve endured that Bobby Deol earworm for nothing.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 2nd Nov 2014.)

Gadzooks! Egad! They Killed Carrot Top!

Archie Andrews, aka the Ron Weasley of Riverdale High, was killed off in this week’s issue of ‘Life with Archie’, causing a whole generation to go, “Who the hell is still reading Archie?” His death gave us 20-somethings yet another reason to whine about how old we are and how we’re *this* close to popping it and being discovered weeks later, our six pet cats feeding on our corpses (which, obviously, would be hunched over a laptop reading a listicle about how old we are.)

I gave up on that self-defeating form of nostalgia once I realised that I would never again be younger than the world’s most popular athletes, musicians and MMS stars. But even so, it was a little weird to hear about Archie and the way he died – shot dead by a gun nut. I guess they wanted to stick to their core idea of Americana. The only way it could’ve been more American is if Archie’s heart had exploded under the weight of bacon grease. But I guess they’re saving that one for Jughead.

If that storyline sounds very different from what you grew up reading, it’s because it is. Life with Archie is a recent spin-off that focusses on the Riverdale gang dealing with modern-day life as adults. The tone is darker, with an emphasis on realistic adult themes, like divorce, illness and the urge to smack anyone who wears baggy pants.

I haven’t read Life with Archie, because if I wanted to experience modern adult life, I could just, y’know, wake up. I wonder what would happen if other formerly-carefree characters from our childhood got their own realistic spin-offs. GI: Joe would just be called PTSD, Johnny Bravo would be getting herpes on Jersey Shore and Captain Planet would meet with a “tragic accident” on a deserted highway because some builder wanted to make a mall out of dolphin carcasses.

Of course, since Life with Archie is a spin-off, the makers have assured us that Archie will still live on as a high-schooler in the regular comic books. Even those have been updated for modern times, which is why they have an Indian character called – you’ll never guess his name – Raj Patel. It’s like every white character in Bollywood being called Bob Smith. (It’s only a matter of time before Indians start sharing feel-good messages about how the UNESCO named Raj Patel as the Best Comic Book Character In The World, and that Jughead is derived from the Sanskrit word, ‘jugaad’.)

One reason why Archie comics were a huge hit in India is because they were our introduction to the wondrous world of America, as imagined by Americans stuck in a time-warp. Archie first made an appearance in 1941, and if you try to read old issues on the website today, you’ll see a disclaimer that states, and I quote, “The issue is a product of its time and may contain material that is offensive to some of its readers.”

That just leads me to imagine the worst storylines possible, like Archie dressing up in blackface for a school play called ‘Why Broads Belong In The Kitchen’, while the commie-hating Mr. Lodge wins an arms contract to kill “those gosh-darned Jap slants”. Or something even more ridiculous, like Jughead being forced to deny his real sexuality.

Oh, wait.

It’s funny to think that the world of Archie was so aspirational in the ‘90s, given that Riverdale was just another boring suburb. It had a burger place and a mall. That’s it. Even Kurla would spit on it today, and that place has rats the size of scooters. I can’t imagine the kids of today reading Archie, but that’s because they can’t read anymore. Wow, that last line makes me sound really old. You guys go ahead and think about Archie – I’m gonna go adopt some cats.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 20th July 2014.)

How Do You Spell GOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAALLLLLLLL?

Woohoo, it’s here, it’s here, it’s finally here! And by it, I mean malaria. Also, the world cup kicked off this week, bringing cheer to millions of die-hard football fans across India parts of Goa, Kerala, Bengal, the North East and Novy Kapadia. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the pre-game show on Sony Six, called Café Rio, featured renowned football expert John Abraham, whose presence caused much outrage among people who like football and also common sense.

I’m told John played a lot of football as a kid, because when you’re a Bandra kid called John, what choice do you have? But I can’t really picture him playing football. He’d dive everytime his face was exposed to sunlight, and just lie there, howling in pain until a medic brought him a tube of Fair and Handsome, after which he’d start moaning about his sweaty pits.

Now I’m no expert on programming, but if people are staying up after midnight to watch the game, they really don’t care about your token roped-in-to-attract-preteen-girls-from-Faridabad Bollywood celeb. Do the fans a favour and get a real expert, like Shibani Dandekar.

But enough cribbing about the pre-game telecast, because now it’s time for more important stuff, like cribbing about the opening ceremony. It featured a performance of the official World Cup song, ‘We Are One’, by Pitbull aka Latino Honey Singh, and Jennifer Lopez, who was a super choice by people who’re stuck in 2002. But the opening ceremony was great overall, assuming the theme they were going for was Annual Day Function At An Average Indian School. I’m pretty sure there were people standing in line for cold samosas, warm Pepsi and if they were lucky, a slice of Monginis cake, which was basically sweetened sandpaper.

Now I can’t wait to watch the 2022 World Cup opening ceremony in Qatar. It’ll probably feature gladiator-style battles between bonded labourers fighting each other for a glass of water, while sheikhs sit back and use their passports as roach material.

(Fun fact: The official world cup footballs are called Brasuca and have been manufactured in Pakistan. Yep, the football is Pakistani, which means it’ll be great at sneaking through defences.)

This is a great opportunity for Indians to learn about Brazil, because as of now, we’re not very familiar with the country. Here’s a list of things Indians know about Brazil:

– There’s a famous statue there that’s doing the Shahrukh arms-wide-open pose.
– Dhoom 2 was shot there.
– Breasts.

It is a foregone conclusion that if you ask Indian guys about Brazil, they will mention the Rio carnival girls. Sure, they may also talk about favelas and the impact that ‘City of God’ had on them, but that’s only because they don’t want you to know that they’re picturing gyrating, bedecked lady bits as they speak to you.

While I’m all for a clothing-optional party, it’s still a little weird to see women dressed in nothing but giant, multi-coloured plumage. It’s really strange to get turned on by something that looks like a peacock got implants. (Of course I say this now, but as kids, we all sneakily watched carnival girls on Fashion TV. Also because they were the only women on that channel who looked like they ate regular food, as opposed to the standard model meal of diet cocaine.)

The world cup is also a great time for people like me – basically a puddle of carbs glued to a couch – to yell out things like “ RUN FASTER, YOU LAZY PIECE OF SH*T!” at athletes with a body fat percentage of minus six. Glory be damned, that is the real beauty of the game, and that is why I’ll be watching until the cup is kissed by the one who deserves it the most: John Abraham.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 15th June 2014.)

Pimp it up!

You know those nagging feelings when you can’t remember whether or not you’ve done something that needs to be done, like say turn off the geyser, or lock the door, or look like an ass-clown in front of a couple of hundred people?

Well, I realised I’d never done the last bit, which is why I signed up to perform at the the Weirdass Hamateur Night at Blue Frog a couple of months ago. 15 amateur comics, 2 minutes each. This is what happened:

CAUTION: Liberal sprinkling of cuss words. NSFW.

Thankfully, no one asked for a refund.

Also, as mentioned in the previous post, some people thought it would be a good idea to give me a regular column in the Hindustan Times. The following links will tell you what I’ve been doing with it:

RE-PIMPAGE: Here is the link to my first HT article, about how I was humiliated by a townie, and why Andheri sucks.

This next one’s about baby-sitting a white female tourist in Bombay. Or as a friend put it, ‘Walking your foreigner.‘

In the third one, I take on the Mumbaikar vs. North Indian issue. However, my take is nowhere as erudite or classy as Deshdrohi.

Next, I pay a heartfelt tribute to Mumbai’s shady bars, where the kids of today are turning into the alcoholics of tomorrow.

Finally, in this last piece I talk about being nose-raped by a virus.

Alright, that’s enough attention-whoring for now.

Over and out.

Raju Ban Gaya Columnist

Alright so this post should have come up a few days earlier, but procrastination seems to be the general trend around here. I just popped in to say that I’ve recently started writing a fortnightly humour column for the Hindustan Times. The first piece was published this Sunday, and you can read it here.

I don’t really have much more to say now, except that this is important to me. So, loyal readers (yes I mean the two of you, plus the porn bots) please do the online equivalent of flinging your underwear on stage in appreciation, that is, check out the column and spread the word.

P.S. Also, for more frequent updates about general rubbish, follow me on http://twitter.com/stupidusmaximus