When the Kings wore Pink

At some point or the other, I am sure most of you have got really attached to a song and couldnt stop humming it day in and day out. Walking down the road, or staring out of the window or sitting down to (a quiet session of) work, it just coaxes itself onto your lips.. and before you realize it, you are tra-la-la-ing to yourself, blissfully immune to hostile stares from your not-too-amused neighbours.

A lot of the times, it happens to be a good song, one that you actually want to sing out. One that atleast you, if not the ready-to-throw-tomatoes-bystanders, can enjoy. However one is not always that lucky.

So you know that your day is half-ruined when a typical Anu-Malik-esque song fevi-quicks itself into your lips. Add to that the vivid imagery of Govinda prancing about in his trademark pink-shirt-lemon-yellow-pants getup, and you start to get an inkling of what I went through around 10 (edit: thats 10 , not 12 years, as I had wrongly posted earlier ).. years ago while writing my history exam in the 7th standard (or was it the 6th..).

It was some time before that (maybe a year or two) that a very controversial song had come out .. in which Govinda proclaims in no uncertain terms to the already distressed world that his pant, shirt, baal, gaal, chaal and rumaal are all sexyy...And he wasnt alone. In typical bollywood group-dance tradition, there were these enthusiastic group of dancers behind him, going gung-ho about this. Now that I think of it, they were mostly male.. hmmmm... how inappropriate was that! (I hope you have got the song now, please). More than the music (which was given by none other than the redoubtable Anu-saarr ), the lyrics were what made the public take notice. Innocent, innocuous Indians not yet exposed to the Ways of the West found this ummm..errr... "sexy"(then usually uttered with a wince in a manner similar to a band-aid being peeled off quickly) word downright unacceptable.

That, I assume, was precisely the reason why the song chipko-fied itself into my head when I sat down to watch TV after a big mug-up session for the dreaded history exam I had to face the next day. Finding myself wiser on the doings of the Cholas and the Rajas, I subjected myself to around half an hr of Govinda-isms before my parents returned back home that night. Before I knew it, I was immersed in the song.

The next day came, I still couldnt get the song out of my head. As I went to write the exam, I tried to remember all I could about the dynasties... but in the background I kept humming...

There cant be a worse exam you give in school. Which year did the Battle of Andu-gundu take place?...As I racked my brains, what I got back was..

Meri pant bhi sexy...

Maybe it was 1350 odd.. or maybe 1377..

Think harder.. you can get this.. you had by-hearted all the dates twice over..

Meri shirt bhi sexy..

What would the Rajas have sung.. ?

And all of a sudden there was Govinda.. leading his troops to battle. A formidable foe faces him, but he seems supremely confident. His Pink body armor sparkles in the sun, and his yellow-pants (or whatever they call what they wore below the belt then) stands in good, stark contrast to the fashion sense of the 1300's. The knight in shining (,blinding and nauseatingly pink) armor is ready to fight. The horns of battle blow, not surprisingly sounding out.. "Meri dhaal bhi sexy... "

He wins the battle. His sexiness quotient rises as women of the other kingdom swoon over him. There is no stopping him now... There and then to the rhythm of clanging armors and amidst approving nods from the crowd, he whips out a blue hankie and goes.. "Yeh rumaal bhi....... ".

1377.. surely.

Why does he always have his teeth out while dancing...?

Of course, as this great epoch in Indian history's wartime-fashion played out in my head, I was battling to come to terms with the questions posed in the paper. Thankfully, they didnt require too much thought, and by the end of the paper, I had envisioned every single personality of note mentioned in the questions in pink'n'yellow disaster-suits.

I dont remember how that song got out of my head. Maybe it was when I realized that I had got a couple of answers wrong, or possibly heard a comment passed by a hapless listener (which I should add, could have been nowhere close to a compliment).

But I do know why I recall that day, and have subjected you to this mind-numbing piece of rubbish. Its because I have this song by Shaan in my head now, that I havent been able to stop humming since yesterday. Thankfully it has a nice tune and good lyrics.. Tanha dil, tanha safar.. dhoonde tujhe phir kyon nazar..

Hope you still return to my blog after this torturous session.. no more pink'n'yellows, I assure you. :)

Personal Note to myself: You'd have better luck solving a 4-D rubiks hypercube in your head.. give it up.. there no way you can understand whats going on in there..