void

On a recent flight to Bombay, I kept myself busy with this particular book by richard Branson. 'Screw it- Let's do it'. the book is very inspiring and thoroughly entertaining. Here's a bit, where he talks about regrets. I just love this example he cites, it's so true cos I feel this way about something or the other everyday.

The great artist Salvador Dali, used to pluck out a ripe supple peach off his tree at home, take a big bite of it, savour it's tender sweet juices for a few moments and then chuck it over the wall, down to the sea below. “In a way,” he writes, “regrets are like wanting the peach you have thrown away. It’s gone, but you are filled with remorse. You wish you hadn’t thrown it away. You want it back. I believe the one thing that helps you capture the moment is to have no regrets. Regrets weigh you down. They hold you back in the past when you should move on.”

This is one of our recent ads for Coolhotmail. I love this one.

CoolHotmail - No More Same Pinch

   
Video: CoolHotmail - No More Same Pinch

As the big silver car made its way up the fourteenth flyover in the damp streets of Mumbai city, an eager hand rolled down the window and popped its head out. Normally wishing for the car to whiz past at Godspeed through sweaty suburbia, it strangely wished for snail motion at the beginning of each one of these flyovers. As the black ribbon road zig zagged up and down cutting through the heart of layers and layers of concrete, it passed by blurry white and yellow windows of light. Windows that allowed a peek into nine pm of strange families in a strange land. The twenty-one inch tv stacked on top of brown and black cupboards in an eight by eight feet room buzzing aloud the nine pm news, of more victims of more floods, celebrities making bombs shooting deer, pleading innocent- nearly as much as the black soot covered plants pleading for their lives in soot covered brass railing balconies. One would say, the little oven rooms with greasy ceilings baking souls inside add to the charm of the old city, but not to the one in the silver car. What is living when it is out of a box everyday every night, happy, content that a day has gone by causing minimal damage to routine. As they plonk on their sofa sets right in time to catch the melodrama soaps, a sweet reward at the end of their day, quenching that daily thirst for action, filling up the cups of void. The eager eye inside the car wondered, if this is the pathetic dull insignificant life that millions choose to live day after day. A fly on the wall of the great old city that never sleeps. But then who was anyone to comment on anyone? As the big silver car made its way down the flyover, the curious one peeked into another window. Two little boys playing with their plastic toy train. Green walls that held a golden plaque with urdu writing. Chatter, laughter, yelling, overlapped by insurance company commercials on the buzzing television set above the almirah. Toys abandoned in a jiffy as their mommy walks in with a plate of steaming hot goodies, that vanish in a second. Anyone passing by would have probably traded anything to be a part of that tiny green happy world. A flyover of contradictions, it thought to itself. But this was 'life', happiness caught in fleeting moments, weaving memories that last a lifetime.

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The Clipper bar and restaurant in Shivaji International Airport Terminal A, is something one would probably choose to miss, while waiting for the security call for their flight. The entrance is on the left hand corner, and as you peek in, there is a railing with a board on a pedestal, and a flight of steps beside which lead you down to the restaurant floor. Coming back to the pedestal, at the entrance on which is placed the elaborate menu, elaborate not in terms of the variety. It's almost as if there is a message in there, saying 'Hang on buddy- before you make your way down the steps to the restaurant, before you embarrass yourself and waste our time, please and please read the menu, and decide if you are worthy to enter.' Surely enough, there it was, a cheese sandwich at five hundred and fifty rupees, a cold coffee with starbucks in brackets for three hundred fifty rupees, and that gives one a clear signal to turn around and head to the more inviting instant coffee kiosk and snack bar on the opposite side. But then one has to explore the unknown, just for fun, just for the heck of it. The flight of steps leads one to smooth polished floors, instant silence like a dainty world below the hustle bustle of local airport riff raff. Heads pop up from their laptops beside white cups of steaming cappuccino or rather large pints of beer, to scan the new entrants, scan what they're wearing, and what flight tag, their baggage held. Disappointed at what they saw, they pause for a sip of chilled lager, and get back to their busy lives on outlook express. The bar counter always seems like the most friendly place to sit. The waiter greets you with a smile, he is trained to do that, places on the counter, a bowl of free cheese lings to munch on, this was after one saw that everyone else had a bowl of free cheese lings in front of them, and demanded for it. Now that one's made their grand entrance, may as well order for a couple of grilled cheese sandwiches and that starbucks frappuchino. It's sometimes entertaining to read the minds of the people around you, for example the guy sitting across, with a the macbook and blackberry, dipping his greasy french fry in ketchup, wondering if the world is full of cheapskates going to expensive bars and billing it to office. The frappuchino comes in a bottle, a very cute bottle, reminds one of the milk bottles that used to be placed outside doors every morning. The waiter pours out the coffee into a tall boring glass, chucking the bottle, but one couldn't help asking the waiter if the bottle could be taken home. And why not, money plants look pretty growing out of such bottles. Or don't some people have a hobby of collecting bottles? Nobody owed the waiter an explanation, so what gives him the right to look all judgmental. Interrupted by the call for security, one asks for the bill (sorry cheque), and shells out a thousand five hundred rupees, remembering to stuff the copy of the bill into the wallet, and makes a speedy exit, up the steps to the more familiar world.

In my school years, I used to be fascinated by advertising. Glossy print advertisements in magazines- The India Today’s, The Feminas, so much so, that I had pretty much made up my mind by the time I was in my ninth grade, that this was the field I wanted to work in. I used to wait to spot the next Amul hoarding, the ads for the Indian Express. I loved pondering over them, wondering how the big idea, occurred to the writer. And how was it that such a simple idea seemed so 'big'. It was exciting. The years when 'Lalitaji' of Surf and the 'Chal meri Luna', and 'Utterly Butterly delicious' were so a part of us, and it stuck to us, till now, till today. The first Liril tune, still ringing in my ear.

Nearly six years back, I stepped into the world that I had always dreamt of. A big agency. big clients, big people. The first few days I was scared to even talk to anyone. I always thought I wasn’t 'creative' enough. I did not smoke, nor did I drink, nor was I a bit quirky or had a streak of madness. I was plain old ordinary, boring. Boring people can only do boring ads I used to think.

I joined as an art director. This is when I met Tony. Tony was the last of them. The last of the writers. The only person who I admired; and was worth admiring. Sure, it was frustrating times working under him. Going up to him with scripts after scripts, and he would just nod his head with a smile, and say; 'try some more'. He was an imposing figure. I used to be scared to go up to him with my notepad thinking, 'What is he going to say this time...'.I used to put myself in his position and rate my ideas, and then safely knock of at least eight from my list of ten. Nobody ever used to go to him with just two headlines. It was always twenty. He made me feel small. But small, in a good way. I knew I had so much more to learn, I could do so much better, I could sense the gap, which gave me some purpose to continue to strive harder.

And then Tony left. And then suddenly, everything seemed to change. The new mantra was obviously this - 'a visual can replace a thousand words'. No one wanted to write anymore. Writers turned 'visualizers' or 'ideators'. Just spend a couple of hours looking for a good picture, and put a few words above it as a headline. And this is what works! Nobody has the time to read headlines they said, let alone go through fifty words of body copy. In fact in this idiot box era, who even reads the papers, let’s just go ahead and make a TV ad. Suddenly everything had become so easy. I could see everyone writing, I dare to imagine what they would have done without Microsoft Word spell-check.  But who cares. Who’s going to read it anyway, let alone spot the odd spello. I can see 'so called copy writers' around me, who write so bad, that I often think...heck I could write better. Not only me, the nineteen year old trainee next to me could. I’m not a writer. I would never call myself one, but none of the others around me have earned the right to call themselves that either. And what’s funny is the fact that they do. They actually believe that by coming up with a smart line with big words pulled out of an online Thesaurus, would win them an award. I feel sad for a couple of young guys, who want to learn the old school way, itching to do good work, but have no one to guide them.

I would say that print is a dying medium, taken over by television, but it’s heartening to see a few ads on air that make you smile. They may not be as memorable as a 'Chal meri Luna', but an example of today which comes close is 'Thanda matlab Coca Cola'. I’m proud to say it's been done by our agency. It's the simplicity that makes it memorable. Stories and dialogues, that is real. I like ads which have dialogues. I know that most writers in my workplace are scared of dialogues. That’s because they just cannot think in a local language, or maybe they are too ashamed to write in Hindi. That's a pity. I detest ads that are fake. Beautiful models, in skimpy outfits. Ads with the Kareena Kapoors.

The Bangalore Times, have already replaced 'The Hindus'. It's where the world is heading, and will continue to. The Tony's of the world will soon be long gone, but those who have had the opportunity to work with them, will always have a conscience that pricks every time they come up with an average idea which almost always gets approved in one shot and released.

A few print advertisements from the good old days, when copywriters existed. Enlarge to read.

Blue pinafores and crisp white ironed shirts, a sudden burst of energy as the gates slide open releasing a hoard of free birds from their caged compartments. Pink and orange ice lollies, red chilli powder sprinkled over wedges of raw green mangoes and thick slices of ripe yellow pineapple, oh what joy awaits on the other side of the three thirty school bell.

On my way back from meetings I often pass by a atleast a dozen schools around this time, invariably causing a heavy jam on the roads. Ten year olds zigzag-ing their way through loud angry buses, villainous bikers and impatient cabbies, yet fearless, yet smiling, celebrating a new found freedom. The next few hours of bliss. A long joyride back home, over endless arguments about whether Blue house is gonna trash the hell out of Red house in the forthcoming sports day. Why Reena maam is always partial to Shruti, just because her handwriting is neat. About why they should have never let Saurav back into the team, just to aggravate podgy Debashish Dasgupta, who will mumble and fumble but never fail to support his dada. Home sweet home, hot pakodas waiting, but no....only after you wash your hands with soap. Cricket or football this evening? Depends on the gang. Ten palms one on top of another. Majority wins. Six thirty. Rahul gets called up for homework. One goes, everybody follows. Geometry over commercial breaks in Tom and Jerry. Phone a friend and announce you finished first. Feel on top of the world.

I can't help thinking to myself that I'll never feel that way again. Little things that used to give me so much joy mean nothing anymore. That little smile, when I see my shoe sparkling brighter than the shoe in front of me in the line. Hoping every morning that it's someone's birthday so that we all get toffees. Butterflies in the stomach while waiting for the teacher to call out my unit test marks. And ofcourse, waiting, waiting for the three thirty bell ring.