One the Charmer, One the Charmed

A bumble bee went buzzing by,
A new dawn saw a rose with spirits so high,
He, the bee stopped to look at the rose, a real beauty
She, the rose blushed a pink so lovely, so heavenly.

They played little games in the bright sun,
He suckling her and she having fun,
Her nectar all his to take,
All the hunting tactics for her sake.

Ah! The charmer and the charmed,
All the little games they played.

70 mm

Meenu hugged her small bag while waiting to cross the road. The road with the incessant vehicles flying past stood between her and the massive building that had taken shape in the last few months. Even as Meenu, all of 15 years lifted her head to admire the sprawling theatre complex that stood before her, a surge of excitement went through her. All the vehicles hurrying to reach their destination had been stopped by a hand under whose control they were, at least momentarily. The man in white could at his will and wish command an entire array of the most powerful to stop and start. Now was his turn to ask them to stop. In doing so, he gave Meenu her 1 minute of freedom to cross the road. But Meenu, as though worried that the policeman might change his mind too soon, rushed to reach her target. The signal timer would have recorded it as 31 seconds.
“Sir, one ticket please”, she asked the man giving out tickets at the counter.
“Do you want the special or the balcony young lady?”
“What can I get for Rs 30 Sir?”
“That would be the special”.
“Thanks Sir”
“Don’t you have someone older accompanying you?”
“Umm.. No.”
“Hope you enjoy the movie”, said the man and smiled.
Meenu emerged triumphant, clutching her tickets and went into the big complex. So someone had called her a lady. She was growing up fast.
The mighty posters proclaiming the upcoming actors and actresses always managed to hold her fascination. She wanted to touch them but was scared someone would shout at her, so she just continued staring at them, her mouth wide open taking in all that those images stated. She felt they spoke a certain language and depending on who stared at it, it would change, just like the movies.
A line had quickly formed before the ENTRY door and she joined in, wanting to be part of that journey, a journey into that fantasy land. She went in and sat down at C-10. This was so special after all, she was so much closer to that big screen spread out in front of her, currently advertising some diamond jewellery. She looked on as the stones seemed to sparkle, and it seemed to reach almost till her, so close that, all she had to do was reach out her tiny fingers and she could touch the ray, the sparkle. When the silver screen seemed to be showing sparkling diamonds, the sparkling shifted from being a verb to a noun, an object she could touch and feel and feel it seep all through her. The feeling of aura had already begun to take over. She had saved some money out of her meager weekly allowance that her parents granted her, and supplemented it with putting Mehendi to excited girls at the stall to make it to this movie and maybe one more. She felt no guilt about watching this movie as she felt she had earned the right to be here.
The massive screen soon exploded with loud music and images began to form in front of her and as ever they held her in a state of rapture. She felt so oblivious to what was happening in the seats beside her and all that mattered was what happened in that big screen in front of her. Within the confines of the wall here all differences died down and the man in front of her was speaking to her as much as he was to the rich old man beside her.
She did not realize the time go by so quickly and now before her was the Knight proclaiming to his princess that the greatest thing is to love and being loved in return. As he said how he can take even a bullet for her, Meenu’s eyes were filled and she wondered about her Knight in shining armour. She wondered if it was really possible to find such a man and if a passion so great really exists. She believed that reel life was really an extension of real life and so if they say so in movies then it sure must. She closed her eyes for just a second to let the tears flow down and as she did so the lights came on declaring an intermission.
She was gripping the chair as the man gripped his woman around her waist talking about his dreams. Those few hours when Meenu was in front of the large screen, the illusion took over and became the reality. This was her world, the reel that became real. Each man and each woman to his own thoughts and emotions as the men and women behind the scenes bring their emotions to play in front of that wonder device – the camera. As the images before her slowly gave way to text and the lights came on, reality took over once again.
Meenu was out in the streets again but with so much to mull over about what had transpired those two hours, which seemed to evoke magic in her every time she was part of the cinema experience. As she was waiting to cross the road, she promised herself she would one day be part of the all that activity behind the scenes that helped merge so many illusory worlds into realities.

Wild O' Jungle Fashion Week

Dr Quack, the Duckess was hurrying by when she noticed Baby Brewy, the Rabbit of the Wild o’ Jungle sitting in a morose mood. In fact Brewy was in such a foul mood that she was sprawled all over the green lawn, that belonged to Bitchy Witch the Owl with her hands cupped over her chin and her gloomy eyes taking a peep out of her all too famous aviator glasses. Dr Quack liked Brewy and liked her most when she was jumping around. “Brewy dearest why are you in such a foul mood baby?”, she inquired of Brewy.

“Booooooohooooooooooo! Booooohooooooooo!”, she wailed.

“Now be a good girl and tell me what happened”.

And so Brewy amidst her heavy sobs and sniffs, narrated a heart rending tale. A sartorial tale of such grave scales that it sent Quack quack so loud that Pecky the woodpecker, who tired after a hard days peck, was taking a short nap, woke up startled by the noise. The moment she spotted Quack she quickly went back to her dream world lest Quack gives her some more naturopathy to deal with. But Quack was still the crying shoulder to baby rabbits to pay attention to peckers of any kind. Her heart went out to the poor rabbit devoid of sexy attire which prevented such a wonderful rabittine from rabbit-walking down the creeper path in the Jungle Fashion Week show, that was rocking the animal world in the Wild o’ Jungle.

But the intelligent Dr Quack was already trying to think of a way out of this sartorial mess. That was when Dr Quack remembered Suzy the Swift who was an amateur designer and her amateurity was She Apparel.

No sooner did the idea strike her that she mentioned it to Brewy who became all pink and cheery. Quack propelled into action soon enough, first dispensing with Brewy’s spectacles and then duck walking quickly to find Suzy the swift.

Suzy was swiftly sifting through her latest designs and inspecting those she felt befit her Main display when Quack entered. Suzy liked Quack a good deal, she had given her a free treatment when she trod a hill and sprained her a little claw on the left leg. She welcomed Quack and tiny Brewy by her side. The moment Suzy heard Quack out, she got into her Designer wear promos.

“Brewy baby, here before you is the red hot checkered skirt peppered with a lot of black that would make you look hot in this sizzling heat. Below that is a kewl Cotton candy skirt emanating hues of pink, the colour of passion that would be the apt attire to beat the heat. You may also want to consider wearing the airy Pink sleeveless top and a blue skirt to match it.”
Suzy paused to catch her breath as she normally does after one of her marketing gimmicks.
Baby Brewy was looking with starry eyed wonderment at all the goodies before her and was wondering what to choose when Quack quacked as though to clear her throat and announced what would suit Brewy the best.
“The Cotton Candy skirt it shall be”, declared Quack proceeding to extract matching pink coolers from her coat, to go with it.
“A Nike pink and grey floaters would be the ideal footwear to go with it.”, she added.

A delighted Baby Brewy walked out of Suzy’s shop happy with her purchase and ran to the hole she had burrowed in Bitchy witch’s lawn to emerge a ravishing beauty.