My eternal love,
It took me years to muster the courage to paint this picture of our love story in black and white but all is well that ends well, yet we have just begun. I would be lying if I said I never heard the romantic Hindi songs playing in the background every time I fell in “love”. I don’t know how you did that, but you had a song for every situation in my life. I remember my very first memory of you was a VCR player with Neel Kamal playing on a B&W TV set; it was magic to my five year old eyes.
Who knew you would be my “bachpan ka pyaar” everyone spoke about in the form of numerous Shahrukh Khan movies I watched at 2 AM on cable, the Khiladi movies of Akshay Kumar I watched multiple times with my brother, the time I spent grooving to Govinda’s songs and adoring Salman Khan in “Oh oh jane jaana” or Hrithik Roshan in his debut movie. They said you spoiled the youth of the nation but youth around the world is spoiled even without your presence in their lives. You just validated all my emotions by saying, “kuch kuch hota hai” and that’s true, something does happen when you are a teenager because your world goes awry and thank you for letting me know I was not alone to feel that way. You are what beaches are to Bombay and what mountains are to Himachal, non-existent without each other. You need lovers like me to survive and I need a love like you to add substance to my life.
I remember once sitting in front of a handmade card I made for someone I love and even after two hours I could only get myself to write, “I didn’t know what to write here. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year” and yet here I am, pouring my heart out for you without sparing details. You taught me how to Carpe Diem, be unapologetically vulnerable and how to not be afraid of falling in love. I strayed from you a few years ago and spent a lot of time watching Hollywood movies. Their movies had no cheesy lines, no songs, excellent visual effects and it was a match made between me and Hollywood by my father. He introduced me to the world of Hollywood which he always referred to very amusingly as “a place where imagination has no bound”. My father is big fan of Hollywood and I jumped on that bandwagon back then, leaving you behind and criticizing you time and again for being archaic and regressive. I frowned at every Punjabi track I heard, every romantic scene performed by over acting cast or the repetitive cast of every other film. I still frown at them but now I have learnt to distinguish and choose between what you have to offer to everybody.
I chose Lootera over Rockstar, Wake up Sid over Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, Udaan over 3 Idiots and in choosing them I chose you. Maybe I fell in love with you again when you gave me movies like Queen, Dear Zindagi, My Name Is Khan or Barfi. Or maybe they reminded me why you will always be my first and eternal love! I have come a long way from admiring 90s movies as a child who saw nothing beyond Shahrukh and Kajol confessing their love on screen to the teenager who embraced Hollywood but had Bollywood flings every now and then to this girl who evaluates the storyline and thinks this here…right here is beyond imagination and you have a little something for everybody to relate to and love. I have loved your journey from romantic and sometimes tragic musicals with banter to Netflix Originals with varied storylines and content. You will always be my definition of cinema, no matter what I watch. Hollywood is a thousand miles away from you but nobody does musicals and emotions like you. It was just wrong of me to draw a comparison and for that I am very apologetic.
People have associated you with many bad traits and labeled you one of the worst industries in the country to work for. You are synonyms to nepotism, patriarchy, disrespectful towards women, women harassment and many other things which are true but the most important thing is we see change and change is the only constant. We have been forgiving cheating partners and abusive relationships, we as humans have always believed in second chances…many second chances for the sake of love. We can sure give you a second chance to grow out of the old phase and step into a new era where you will always find rookie lovers like me waiting to embrace you with open arms.
I would just like to say how much I love you and life would be incomplete without you. I might be a world cinema fanatic now but my roots will always run deep into Bollywood. I still watch 90s movies when I am overwhelmed to remind myself how beautiful life is. I would like dedicate my favourite dialogue to you,
“Itni shiddat se maine tumhe paane ki koshish ki hai, ke har zarre ne mujhe tumse milane ki saazish ki hai. Kehte hain ki…agar kisi cheez ko dil se chaaho to puri kayanat usey tumse milane ki koshish mein lag jaati hai.aaj aap sab ne mujhe meri chahat se milaya. Thank you , thank you very much. Main aap sabka shukra guzar hun ke aapne mere khwabo ko yakeen mein badal diya. Itna..itna ke I feel like the king of the world aur aaj is baat ka bhi yakeen ho gaya ke humari filmo ki tarha humari zindagi mein bhi, end mein sab theek ho jaata hai. Happys ending! Aur agar theek na ho, toh who the end nahi hai dosto. Picture abhi baaki hai”.
Your forever rookie lover
Naam toh suna hi hoga ;)
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