MTV select

Last evening, I stepped into the neigbourhood beauty parlour for what they term as a ‘powder trim’. What they do is to snip off your hair just at the tip. This helps get rid of split-ends without having to sacrifice on the length of your hair.
This parlor always has the TV on, usually playing some Hindi movie channel. Initially, I remember worrying if the ladies would pay justified attention to the waxing and preening they are supposed to be doing. But over time I gained confidence in them. I saw that they used the TV more like a radio. We customers got a glimpse of TV if possible. We have to crane our eyeballs, since we can’t usually move our heads when we are undergoing a session in threading.
That was the background. So yesterday, I heard a familiar voice on this TV. It felt like I had gone back 10 years. It was MTV select. The show where you got to speak to Nikhil Chinnapa on the phone and then select one song from the list of songs that scrolls along one edge of the screen.
I found a lot of things interesting at that point of time.
1) They were watching MTV. I thought MTV was reserved for the niche, super-urban youth, not a bunch of beauty parlour ladies – clearly things have changed
2) Nikhil Chinnapa was hosting the show, in the exact same way that he did when he first started out as a VJ on MTV!
a. I loved that show back then when I was 15. I even called them once and was thrilled to hear the MTV voice message. Though Nikhil never called back
b. I thought he was one of the hippest, coolest people on earth. I would have killed to get a chance to meet him and hang out with him
c. However 10 years have passed since. I have grown-up. Not into MTV that much anymore. Not into Nikhil Chinnapa and his numerous finger-rings anymore. (Definitely not after seeing his prowess at ragging poor MTV roadie aspirants)
3) How come Nikhil hasn’t grown in these past 10 years? I don’t see any development. He is the same with the same wise-cracks, the same style of dressing and so on…
4) Lastly, but most importantly, Nikhil’s conversation with one of his callers. He spoke in exactly the same way. But the caller had changed in the last 10 years. When asked who she would like to dedicate her sing to, she said “to myself”. Nikhil did not question that and went on to play the song.
a. Clearly a stark difference from the dedications callers made before - “parents, God, friends, that special friend who I can not name on TV…etc”
b. She was self-affirmed and not nervous to hear her voice on TV.

It was splendid!