Perhaps I just don't get it

It's quite funny. It reminds me of your blog, she said.

Now since Ka is someone with a rather refined sense of humour, I felt quite elated at the time. Right now - not so much.

But wait ... I seem to be getting ahead of myself.

In January of this year, I woke up in Gurgaon one morning, having spent the night at T's place. While T and S were still slumbering, I was sitting in aunty's room, chatting away with aunty, Ka and Ka's better half - Sands; when I happened to notice a white covered novel with random caricatures on it, and the catchy title of "Dilli Toh Pagal Hai".

What's this?, I asked, hoping to be able to steal another one of T's novels (I had "borrowed" "Are All Women Leg Spinners" once upon a time, but liked it enough to warrant never giving it back. Small sacrifice for him, considering the rubbish he has put me through, which includes but is not limited to stealing my money, hiding my shoes and convincing me to walk to the Principal's office in my socks and having it announced on the school's PA system, leaving me to walk through a highly foggy Delhi winter night in the middle of some Godforsaken colony, having me slapped by that idiot music teacher, made me lie to save his ass and etc.). Unfortunately, it belonged to the always sweet (to me) and ever-satark (as in cautious) Ka, who went on to explain that it was a collection of short stories, essays rather, about Delhi ... and that *insert first line here after converting to past tense*.

I puffed up my chest and resembling a cockatoo more than ever (my hair does really strange things when I wake up), let out on articulate "Oh really" (no wonder I'm such an accomplished writer!). I would have gone on to read a bit of it (and saved myself the ... no no G, keep them guessing ... long post long post), but just at that moment came a harpy-ish wail of "Mummmaaaa breakfasssst". It's up, we all exclaimed together, and braced ourselves for T. But that's another tale for a different time.

The thought of DTPH remained with me for two reasons - I absolutely adore anything (specially anything funny) being written/directed/made about Delhi, and two - like a white cat under a villain's ring-ed palm, my ego had been stroked. Purrr indeed.

So as it happened, I found myself in South Ex one evening, and walked into Tekson's (does it have an apostrophe?) bookshop ... and sure enough, there it was - displayed front and center - Dilli Toh Pagal Hai. Rs. 195, said the flourescent sticker. Hmm ... must be worth it, I thought. Picking it up, I walked over to the cashier - some totally daft woman who was more interested in giggling over the telephone than serving paying customers. Polite boy that I am, I waited. She looked up all of a sudden, gave me an annoyed look for having disturbed her (I am sure) idiotic conversation (but please note - she was still very much on the bloody phone), and held out her hand. I gave her the book, 200 rupees, and a big fat zero in customer care. Needless to say, my smile had been replaced with scorn and disgust - two emotions which, I am told, I do not have difficulty displaying. As if!! ... anyhow, she put the book in a bag (chalo, at least some basic sense - or it could simply have been a Pavlovian reaction. Whatever.) along with my bill, and handed the bag to me. And looked away!!!! Dumb bitch. I did not budge a frikkin inch, and in my most contemptuous voice, asked - WHERE IS THE CHANGE? She looked up again, clearly confused at having been unable to complete her simplistic simian duties, looked at something on her screen (I presume it was the bill), and gave me a 5 rupee coin. I sincerely hope she was not talking to her future husband, for I feel I would have done another human a grave disservice indeed at not having informed him that he was about to marry someone with an IQ of minus 8 billion.

As I was saying ... I bought the book, and left.

I read the very first story (The ABC of D(elhi) - what a smart title) in the auto on my way back home. And remember chuckling away, since Shivjeet Kullar was indeed quite funny. Yes yes, I said to myself - what he writes is certainly true. What an astute observer. Ha ha. Or was it one of those laughs that you force out of yourself because you expect something to be funny? You know - kind of like how a dish HAS to be tasty just because some famous chef prepared it. Welcome to Gordon Ramsey's restaurant - Trotters, anyone? So I was amused, but forgot all about the book once I tucked myself into bed at night and picked up Asimov to finish the third of the Foundation novels. Which, by the way, are brilliant!!! And DTPH rested on the side table, and made its way back to San Diego with me at the end of my vacation. And then hung out with the other books in my highly messy bookcase. (How very LOTR this sounds!)

Until today.

Sidenote - will I ever get to the point? Yes ... now. End sidenote.

Today being the day that I caught the red eye to the east coast. And having a serious dearth of reading material, picked up City of Djinns (which I hope to finally finish reading) and the novel around which this tale is being spun.

You will go mad with laughter - proclaimed the publisher. Beware, you'll fall off your balcony laughing - said one reviewer. You cannot live in Delhi and not read this book - said another. Aah, a good time is going to be had - said I. The lady sitting next to me surreptitiously glanced at the novel, wondering (no doubt) whether I was about to start reading Letters to Penthouse or some such. How silly. If that had been the case, I obviously would have said - Aah, a jolly good time is going to be had.

And I moved on to story two - ABC of Punjabis. Umm .. ok. Kinda like the first one, but I'm sure it's going to get better. A to Z of Punjabis was followed by something called Arey Mainoo Bhi Karna Hai!, Kabhi Affair Mat Kehna, and Mine Is Bigger Than Yours. I read on, and kept waiting ... waiting for an end that wouldn't come ... ooh, see what I did there? ... I took that famous line (haan it is famous) from Titanic and used it in a totally different context. Literary genius I am. Well the end didn't come because I read some more and then decided to blog about it, there-by never getting to the last story, but what I was going to say did not come was the laughter. Or even a smile. Admittedly, there were a couple of lines that were funny - but I would still have been very much sane and alive even if I was sitting on the ledge of my balcony and reading this book.

I understood what he was trying to do here - take incidents that we all see on a daily basis in Delhi, and put a hilarious spin on them. Except for the hilarious part. Or the spin. He just ended up stating the obvious - as if he was someone remotely funny ranting to himself. Or on a blog.

Uh oh.

See why the afore-mentioned elation at Ka's comment evaporated?

But I'm not someone who writes for a newspaper, and my columns have not been converted into a supposedly highly funny book. (Jealous much?). But I paid almost 200 rupees for this, and I wanted my money's worth. Which, I am sorry to say, I most certainly did not get. Now I must agree that a few stories I read were indeed quite touching. But I did not want to read Chicken Soup for the Delhi-ites Soul. I paid for a book to make me laugh, and it did not keep its promise. Which obviously makes me feel cheated. To me, his humour was childish at best. Allow me to give you a couple of examples (I'll pick the "poems" since the stories will take a little bit to type):

Page 25: The Bootiful Mrs. Khanna-ji

This is Mrs. Khanna, she'll make you dance to her tune
She rarely ever smiles, maybe once in a blue moon
Many years ago, she looked quite hot
Now when he hubby sees what he's got
He wonders how on earth someone blew her up like a balloon

Page 48: The Happy Gay Designer

Meet Anshu the designer - so happy and gay
Always smelling so nice - be it night or day
His clothes are so very posh
As he says, 'Oh dear' or 'Oh gosh'
And he parties every night - be it December or May

What ... the fuck??

I have put the book away now, and do not plan to get to it again. Ever. If any of you are interested, let me know and I will be happy to let you borrow it. It certainly is not worth buying.