On crashing an intellectual gathering...

It was not a party we were invited to. Well, not directly invited at any rate. But a friend of ours was asked to it, and we tagged along. Free food and free alcohol? Come on, that’s an irresistible combination. Stop judging me. I’m sure you would have done the same when you weren’t making money!

Anyway, so the five of us walk in and look around a little sheepishly. It’s not a very big party and people are scattered all over the house. We feel conspicuous, and huddle together. The host (or some pseudo-host) dawdles over and offers us drinks.
“Sure!” beams out truly-and-directly-invited-friend.
“Sure!” we echo, rather weakly.

Once we’ve settled down with our vodka-and-Cokes and a bowl of chips, we begin to look around. And realize we’ve been provided with free entertainment as well.

There are a whole lot of people from a certain architecture school, famous for- well... actually, I’m not sure it’s famous for anything in particular but its students sure seem to think it’s a great place. I’m just going to take their word for it; sometimes you’ve got to have a little faith in people and what they say, you know?

So anyway, there are a number of women in cotton, ethnic-printed, Fabindia/ Anokhi saris and an equal number in Levi’s jeans and cotton, ethnic-printed, Fabindia/ Anokhi kurtis. Now, don’t get me wrong. I LOVE Fabindia and Anokhi. And I adore cotton, ethnic-prints. But it gets a little tiresome if that’s all you see. A bit like those identically dressed, plasticky, mini-skirted girl-gangs that we all love to hate in Hollywood high-school flicks. A little bit of variety is nice, you know, be it in the midst of high-school-drama or drawing-room-conversation…

The men are equally clone-ish. Raggedy kurtas, dirty-ragged-jeans (why is intellect necessarily synonymous with dirt and lack of maintenance and upkeep?) and (hold your breath-) French beards. Voila! If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.

And worse still, if you’ve heard one, you’ve heard them all.

The-Woman-With-The-Dramatic-Snaky-Bindi-Creeping-Around-On-Her-Forehead: “You see, the premise of Chandralekha is that it’s vertically conceptualized, rather than horizontally. Then, obviously, when you see it, you must view it vertically because to do so horizontally is to lose the otherness inherent in the form!”

G. ventures a question: “Chandralekha? Which part of the country is that from?”

Snaky-Bindi shoots him a look of utter contempt: “It’s a post-colonial-style, three-minute documentary about the hallucinatory madness of an Ethiopian monkey. Made by a friend of ours in Andhra Pradesh. It will tell the world about the sufferings of the Ethiopians.”

G. looks confused, and ventures to ask a second question: “The sufferings of Ethiopian monkeys?”

Snaky-Bindi’s eyes now shoot Rajasthani-heritage-daggers at G: “Are you trying to be funny? Because it’s not funny you know. The Ethiopian situation is encapsulated in the monkey’s descent into madness. Even as we speak, the documentary is being shown at various film festivals in Mongolia. And R. has already got an offer to shoot the Mongolian royal family’s palace. He's going to be tied up with that now, for the next few months.”

G. decides to work up enough courage for one last question: “But then, what about the Ethiopian people? I thought the movie was going to give rise to a movement, maybe some charity events…?”

Snaky-Bindi has had enough: “You are just revealing your narrowness of vision. It’s about a movement in the mind, don’t you see? You must transcend this necessity to see everything translate into concrete terms. The otherness of insanity must be transformed into a holistic unity and that’s the only way to deal with the madness of modern civilization!”

G. has also had enough. We walk off, collapsing into laughter as G. downs his drink… “What the fuck…? Otherness? Vertical? Horizontal? Why can’t people speak in plain fricking English?”

Ah well... At the best of times, critical terminology is a wonderful thing. It allows us to conjure up entire systems of thought with one word or one phrase. But critical terminology should not obscure what you’re trying to say! It should make your point clearer, shouldn’t it? Unless, of course, you’re hiding the fact that you don’t really have a point to make at all…

“Shall we go have the kakoris? They’re yummy.”
“Yes, let’s. And let’s stuff a couple into Snaky-Bindi’s mouth as well. Then maybe the room will stop resounding with her "otherness"!”

We stuff ourselves with kakori kebabs, swig a couple of drinks, and flee the party. There’s only so much erudition us mere mortals can take in one night.

I know, I know. We’re horrible people. We crash people’s parties and drink their alcohol and eat their food, and then laugh at them! We’re simply awful. But I wouldn’t trade places for the world. Being on this side of the fence is way too much fun...!