Letter to SRK

A 'dear' doesn't suffice to encapsulate exactly how dear you are to me. So I would do away with it. I already feel I am writing to someone I know well -- a celebrity, but my own. How many times in life can you do that? Hi :)

As the facebook feed becomes active with wishes for you, and my mother calls me (from the other room) to inform me to watch a certain channel on which they are showing you, and my aunt puts up a status in honour of your birthday (yes SRK, generations love you), I sit here, typing out to you. I had decided last night I would wish you in this manner. You have been a part of my growing up and that necessitates this piece. I do not remember how I looked when I bring back the oldest memory I have of you. I remember the room in which the TV was, and you in a mop of hair covering your temple. I did not know it was Circus my mother was watching. 

Next I know we were in a different town, and one of my young aunts was excited about this new boy called Shah Rukh Khan who featured in this movie called Deewana. Yes, rather likeable. I had come to Calcutta for the winter vacation and heard my grandmother tell my mother to go watch Darr in the theatres. We watched it in VCR. What a movie! What shirts you wore! And thus it began. The typical childhood crush developing into 'my favourite hero' and generating a reverence which accepts all your flaws but denies anyone undermining your efforts.

Through school I kept hearing so many people saying I looked like you with that crop on my temple and the Baazigaar carbon frames. At college friends mentioned our smiles were similar. At home the only time there was peace over TV between my mother and me was when you were in it. The opening of your arms in gorgeous locales, your intimacy with Karan and Farah (interesting how I thought of those two names over Kajol and Juhi), your easy dance moves and your association with YRF and Dharma Production similar movies did nothing to deter my love for you.

Over a period of time you became more of a brother for me. Haha, true. I love the fact that my mother's almirah has a photograph of me, and one (cheap postcard types in a blood red shirt) of you. There is no lust I harbour for you the way I have always had for say a Fardeen Khan (let us not go there). You are just there. In cricket and advertisements and talk-shows and amazing self-appraisal documentaries and the way you speak, it is discernible that you are a man of extreme clarity over anything else. That time when KKR won and you were banned from entering the Mumbai Cricket Ground, what you spoke was uncontaminated radiance. The business man in you is so accurate, it is inspiring. You are the teacher I never had. If that makes my life one with a lack, I would care a fig. For, more than theorems and formulas I remember your "Agar kisi cheez ko dil se chaho toh saari qayaanat tumhe usse milani ki saazish karti hai", and your "hum ek bar jeete hain ek bar marte hain...(total shit the rest of it)", and "zindagi mein kuchh banna ho, kuch haasil karna ho, hamesha apni dil ki suno...". Teacher par excellence. Of how to convince with the power of stereoptypical mesmerizing articulation.

'Sattar Minute' from Chak De India, and the train shot in Swades, KKHH and Kabhi Haa Kabhi Naa -- you have weaved a pattern of happiness in my life. That day when I happened to be in City Centre waywardly and was blocked out of the blue from going out, it was astounding for me to soak in the pleasure of seeing you in person. The extended smiles of our family when your songs pop in from somewhere is a true family-moment. I adore sudden sights of you on hoardings feeling it is a luck factor for me. And though I would never use a Navratan Tel endorsed by you, the first car I am buying (which comes in this week) has a little to do with your Hyundai promotions. 

Happy Birthday Shah Rukh. God bless you with more intelligence and more charm. I may not have seen Happy New Year yet, but I do know why you wear the Ray Ban day in and day out. It's ok to age. It cannot wrinkle the exuberance of what you are to us, each moment. Happy Birthday again. I wish you more stardom and more oration power.

Love (in all its muchness),

K.

PS: This is one of my favourite Rahuls played by you. Sunshine on a winter afternoon.

H A P P Y  B I R T H D A Y  :)