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India Update: What's in the Papers?

While I was waiting around at the travel agent's today, reading the stories about yesterday's bombings in Varanasi, I heard one of the male agents wish a female colleague a happy "women's day". Huh? I turned to the papers for help. Sure enough, there were lots of mentions of International Women's Day, a holiday I think it's safe to say is not exactly at the card-and-flowers or even greet-your-fellow-worker level in the States.

More after the jump.

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Television / Indian Pop Culture / → All Tags

India Update: What's on the Tube?

It's impossible to overlook the ads here. For one thing, they're always louder than the shows themselves. During HBO's or AXN's frequent movie broadcasts, the ads come in randomly, at times that have nothing to do with the action or the plot. If the ads wait until a scene has ended or when someone's finished being killed, then that's purely by coincidence. That's OK, though, since many of the ads hold your attention more than the movies.

Most of the ads are in a mix of English and Hindi. One ad, for a new kind of noodles, ends with the happy slogan "Taste bhi. Health bhi" ("Both taste and health"). The less English there is, the more carefree and entertaining the ads often seem. One of the more riveting ones showed a woman hanging onto a rope over a cliff. Gloating over her was a big evil dude  -- going by his big handlebar mustache and other accessories, it was probably the demon king Ravana. As far as I can tell, the lady in peril got out of her predicament by distracting Ravana with a delicious Cadbury candy bar (only 5 rupees! And they're very good).

The English-language ads are rarely as fun as this. They are slicker, though. A major proportion of them are for cell phones, especially the models that cost the equivalent of $200 and up -- not exactly pocket change. Scooters are also very popular subjects -- one ad, for a brand that can evidently only be operated by a cheeky woman, uses a song that asks a little plaintively, "Why should boys have all the fun?" I don't know, but I do know that no guy is ever going to come within 100 meters of that thing.

And then there are the saturation-level ads for Café Chino, Pepsi's mashup of coffee and cola. The scene takes place in the sort of office in which attractive workers can easily dirty-dance with each other. After the semi-sexy guy in the ad is done tussling with the gorgeous Bollywood stars Kareena Kapoor and Priyanka Chopra, he ends up tamed and covered with lipstick kisses. The ad is annoying in the way that most successful commercials are the world over. I just wish I could get the damn song out of my head.

Television / Indian Pop Culture / → All Tags

India Update: What's on the Tube?

From his observation deck in Bangalore, John Rambow will be reporting weekly on television and other parts of Indian popular culture.

When I first got here, I didn't think that there'd be much TV in English at all. There are a lot more Hollywood movies than I thought there'd be, but it's not exactly Grade A stuff. We end up watching a lot of action and horror movies that we never even heard of back in the U.S. Webs, anyone? How about Octane, in which Mischa Barton and Jonathan Rhys Meyers take turns chewing up the scenery?

The TV is free from anything indie or arty. Vanity Fair (2004) was just on last night, but I suspect that had more to do with how great Reese Witherspoon looks riding an elephant in the film's supersaturated India ending and less to do with anyone's love for Empire waists.

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