if the man on the left has started looking like the man on the right to you...
and you notice the same thing here...
and here too,
then no what the about it, know now and know well, that along with being addle pated, crack pot sanka jhalli, non stop talker and fried stuff gobbler, you are struck for life. you are in love.
an attraction growing, asserting itself. an emotion that is bursting out of restrictions and wanting to express itself. why was she walking past that wobbling stool so slowly staring up at him, why was he taking forever to fix some wires, his ears fully concentrating on her exchange with anjali? and now, why were they lying entangled with each other on that rangoli for so long, just looking at each other? he took a while before he took over and got the two up on their feet again and again he kept on holding her hand looking at her, while she just couldn't break that hold of his gaze.
why?
ever since nainital and babu ji's sudden paralytic stroke, there's a pressure it seems on the two to acknowledge something. she had asked herself why she'd raced to him in that hospital, needing his shoulder to lean on. she hadn't yet answered that question. but as if to help her along, the writers had written in an untenable scenario. a marry shyam campaign mounted by bua ji. this should help her answer some questions, even if the constant thoughts of him and not being able to look away didn't.
on his side, he is finding it difficult not to quicken to her presence, not be around her, not look at her. his heart knows answers his head hasn't asked to hear yet. this need to make everything alright for her. how poignant his promise to the girl of his heart, "everything will be alright," while putting his arms around the girl his head had chosen. yet, it wasn't such a bad head either... this girl will do more for him and his heart than many can ever imagine, even now.
"hello hi bye bye arnav bitwa, lagat hai tum ko koi galat faimi ho gai hai aree ee holi nahi... diwali manayka seazhun hai." arnav dear, seems you have misunderstood, this is diwali not holi, says mami as she sees him covered in rangoli hues.
galat faimi. misunderstanding. no, this was the most powerful time of understanding, coming to the brink of acting upon it, and going back. because the heart wasn't ready. willing wanting yearning, but not ready.
the misunderstanding would come later.
he can't look away from her. ever since that day in the hospital, ever since that fairy light thing. ever since she asked pata kaise chalta hai, ever since he saw her in a red sari, in the storm with her hair tossed, on a ramp where she was not meant to be... ever since forever... he can't stop looking at her.
la calls her away. she's teaching la to wear a sari, such a happy smile on her face that her student at last is showing interest. an open happy khushi smile. la is making a mess so she tries it on herself. he is watering his plants.
gust of wind... awareness... he looks up and there she is... wrapping the soft material around her.
wind, water, fengshui... the elements were always there taking part in this love story. perhaps an indication that it was meant to scale the three dimensions, merge with a larger reality. not that this was the first time one saw use of the elements to heighten drama or a feeling, but rarely did it seem so perfect and believable.
i repeat, sanaya irani and barun sobti made what can easily become corny and laughable seem beautiful, plausible, rather lovely. you wanted to lose your grip on your reality and enter the fantasy with them.
how barun managed to keep his tycoon shatir image on despite all this wind, water, stars, long deep stares into girl's eyes and lifting her up all the time is beyond me. also no idea how sanaya kept us believing khushi was clean, sweet, innocent, with no guile, and no thought of trapping this man despite the number of times she was stuck in eyelocks with him or fell into his arms. some calibre both. yes, we did suspend our disbelief and yes we are desperate to believe in love eternal too maybe, an idea more precious than money to many of us. but still. so much fluff, yet the characters intact. deserves applause and thought about acting.
"soch soch ke paagal ho rahe hai... yeh sab uss laad gover... arnav ji ki vajah se ho raha hai... na wo hume... aur na hum..." i'm going mad thinking, all this is because of that laad gov... arnav ji... if he hadn't... if i hadn't...
khushi can't take the heat of this moment any more and rushes out saying she's unwell, needs medicines. and as she walks aimlessly, the questions come. she speaks to devi maiyya, i have always felt this was khsuhi's way of talking to herself, her most inner, clear divine part. the part we all have in us i feel.
delicate delicate words, about the state of heart. from another time in writing, not today's. nowadays we seek simplification of every feeling... dropping off all wondering and complexity. but here it is different, her "na wo hume, aur na hum..." what does it mean really. nothing is clear, yet, we all know what it's all about. slivers and little bits and pieces of every emotion around a larger compelling one, which is usually described in one word. but that word is never said.
"aap yahan?" you here?
he's the auto driver.
"jana kahan hai?" want to go where? gruff rough, typical auto man. yet not. awww.
"aap auto chala rahe hain?" you're driving an auto? her tycoon at the wheel of phatphatiya, all oily and bucolic.
she is beginning to get it. she recalls telling payal just the other night, "humne socha tha jab pyaar hoga toh asman mein taare aur bhi chamakne lagenge, har jagah sirf wahi nazar aayenge..." thought when i fall in love, the stars will shine brighter in the firmament, and everywhere i'll see him only...
"arre ye madam, auto na chalaoon toh kya hero ban jaaoon," hey madam, not drive auto, then what, become a hero?!! comes the irate reply from the auto guy. the real one, since the one seeing things has run off. the dialogues are brilliant, funny, rofl giving even, yet with layer. she is running from the deduction her mind has finally started to make.
what's happening to me, dm... no nothing is happening... i am fine. this is too much information for this slip of a girl. in love with arnav singh raizada? nooo. yet, how lovely that switch to "arnav ji" from "laad governor" at the start of her dialogue with dm.
her arnav ji, whom she loves, whom she thinks of the moment her dream man is mentioned, who mustn't go hungry, who has a gussa he can't control, who makes her heart go dhakdhak, who watches her wearing a sari and she can't bring herself to think "ew creep," (imagine if shyam were doing that instead of asr), that arnav ji, whom she sees everywhere.
but she can't face that yet.
"namaste, pandeji," to the guard at rm.
"what the!" says the guard like the auto man, music goes haywire, khoosie bitiya bolts, nooo, this can't be happening.
inside rm, safe she is, but... "shubh deepavali, khushi ji." uh oh, it's not op and his cutesy chatter, it's the dhobi, the washerman, and he is also that man in her dreams, that arnav ji.
a fabulously funny segment... cinema like, have i ever seen this interpretation of love struck before? can't remember but maybe some movie had it. no matter, here done brilliantly, and truly creative because it's intrinsically part of story... this is how khushi realises she is in love. so, not just some self indulgent, for the sake of it humour. also, could khushi's realisation come in a calm wise way? an essential element of khushi had to be part of this momentous realisation. that ajeeb element. and that was here aplenty.
again barun showed us what an actor sits inside this slim, good looking, ex call centre manager, a boy from west delhi with not great marks in school, who has no formal training in acting. i do so want to see this actor in a whole range of different roles. can't decide if i like auto man more or dhobi. think i'll settle for dhobi, oh that dhobi ismiliya. he can give banwari a good run for his gathrie.
she decides to close her eyes and walk so as not to see him. addle pated anyway, utterly addle pated in love.
of course, she bangs into him, who else. and he just holds her... and keeps on holding her... his face is full of concern, bit of a "what the" there, but his hands are holding...
this is the primal attraction that is headed straight toward a pool and an ocean of roiling, tumultuous desire. i hold my breath feeling its onrush.
aanchal, difficult to explain in english, the free end of your saree, the ends of your dupatta, all can be considered aanchal. the indian woman has used her aanchal to do many things, wipe away tears, protect her child by covering her/him with it, a sense of shelter in it, of a place to hide from the harshness of the world, very much an extension of the role a woman plays in society, as mother, as elder sister. this is uniquely woman, her ability to shelter with love and her shakti, her strength. all of it somewhere in that aanchal. as i said difficult to explain, clumsy effort. the aanchal is where here love her innate female strength her power in life gets expressed. it is also where she gathers her dreams sometimes.
walking back home alone, under the stars, in talk with dm, she acknowledges at last. she'd asked for only one sign from dm to help her understand what she should do about marrying shyam. dm had deluged her with signs, overflow like that watering can of his.
she is muttering..."hum... theek nahin hain... tabhi toh hum shadi nahin karna chahte." i am not okay... all those isharas... that's why i don't want to marry.
shyam was waiting at gh, eavesdropping, plying extreme manipulation. jalebis for khushi and lanterns, for he knows of her little rituals with babu ji every diwali. khushi's talk with her father is lovely and touching. her shelter is in danger, the main support in her life. unknown to her a man is getting ready to become just that and more to her. while the pretender shuffles around trying to usurp the place.
she cries alone under the stars, none of her problems have easy solutions. shyam enters with his sick play... khushi smiles at his jalebis, even his lanterns, but when he tries to catch her hands (note in a crocodile like bite), and gives his spiel of how whenever there's andhera, darkness, he will bring roshni, light, to her life, all she remembers is a man sitting one chair away in a cold desperate hospital, putting his hand on her head. a man who doesn't say much, who makes no promises, but in her hour of darkness, he brought light. she snatches her hand away.
one word is too often profaned for me to profane it,one feeling to falsely disdain'd for thee to disdain in.one hope is too like despairfor prudence to smother,and pity from thee more dear
than that from another.
this story of nafrat that was mohabbat, of a girl who'd rather take the gussa from one than the "love" from another, this inexplicable play of emotion that points you in the right direction despite what conventional wisdom or the apparent truth might say, it so reminds me of this intense love poem by shelley read in college.
i can give not what men call lovebut wilt thou not accept
the worship the heart lifts aboveand the heavens reject notthe desire of the moth for the star the night for the morrowthe devotion to something afar
from the sphere of our sorrow?
that desire of the moth for the star has started in him and is flaming, it will turn to that worship the heart lifts above and the heavens reject not. both will reach out from the sphere of their sorrow and grasp this word and turn it into that devotion.
in a story that was doomed to be forgotten, another lovely girl thinks of light and diyas and meeting a young man who wants to give her the most beautifiul lamp but she will not let him. he thinks of her too as his mother prattles on. akash and payal, a gentle different love story enters its deeper layers. she has started thinking of him too, as he has been from the moment they met.
can khushi lie back and sort out her confusion and enjoy her little secret with herself? no such luck. the moment she entered, bua ji had planted the idea of jadoo tona in her head. black magic. sanka devi's sanak is on the rise, what ails her? could it be that someone has cast a spell? nice writing, will lead us straight to another heart erupting moment by the pool.
now amma is badgering khushi about her decision regarding marriage to shyam. bless shyam and amma, we have khushi going nuts and scurrying to her mountain... jalebi mountain. as she makes it, what a dream.
her fertile imagination comes up with a great one. she is married to her khadoos laad g. married? what a jump... the girl has just figured out she is in love with the boy. now she's much married already? khushi ji... uh huh. shadi shuda, and doing all the things that shadi shuda girls do? in less than an hour? now i need to stuff samosas in my mouth.
but with shyam, who's so ugh sweet, a calm, in control khushi.
in the span of one episode, khushi has recognised him as her man, identified that he is the one that brings light to her life when it's dark, and seen him as her husband, herself his wife. take away the fun and games, and there's a serious passionate emotion here. after her parents' death, khushi has lived among people who have given her extreme love, but somehow she's always felt beholden, grateful, tried always harder to better, more for them. her gratitude is lovely, but her sense of right, "huq" over anyone is fragile. that huq her heart exercises over asr, without permission from her or him. this is possibly the single clear ishara she had sought from her divine mother.
and an ishara to us from dm. hair. cut.
