Bang Bang Boom.

It pays to know Leela .She’s a journalist. So she gets to meet up with the rich and famous. Or did circa March 1993.Her brief for the day was to meet Ian Anderson. Sometimes mistakenly called Jethro Tull. That was the name of the band, not the man.
He was on a pre concert tour of India. Staying at the Oberoi. Right next to the Air India building. Which only a few days earlier had been bombed. RDX ripping thru the lobby. Destroying things and people. The first question that Leela asked in her allotted fifteen minutes with the legend was whether he had any apprehensions about coming to Bombay so soon after the blasts. Going to India with warnings from the British Government that said do at your own risk ? Yes he did. But he was from England. He’s gone thru the antics of the IRA. Seen the damage terrorists could do first hand. If he didn’t come to Mubai the terrorists had won. Won what they set out to do. Which was to disrupt life. To dictate what you did and when. Dictated by fear. Terrorists , terrorise. But if we stay home, they win. So here he was in the lobby of the Oberoi. Posing for a picture with his flute. Balancing on one leg against the back drop of Marine Drive and the Arabian Sea. A million miles from home. On a trip nobody would have questioned him not making.
The interview went on , to musical influences, and defining moments in life. What he ate for dinner and what the next album was going to be about. And how his daughter was not a fan of his music. She wanted to know why he didn’t play some Bon Jovi covers.
That day with him, the terrorists did not win.

Barack Obouza,Rebello House, Hill Rd., Bandra.

Arre baba how he's so dark. Lets put channa ka atta on him. He's looking like a khapri with this curly hair. Don't worry.When it's little longer we'll straighten it out. With what ? The Murphy iron. On cardboard. You think my hair was always straight ?
Thank god it's a boy. If he was a girl, the ad saying wheatish complexion in the matrimonials twenty years down the line would be science fiction. Don't take him in the sun. He wants to play outside ? Only after the sun goes down .
So little Barry went to school. In a nation that sees itself as brown, in a world that has only black or white. But he being browner than most was called black. It made him reach higher. To shut out teases and taunts. The curly hair was still curly. The channa ka atta was now used for bhajjias only.
For the Christmas play he was choosen to play the Gollywog. No need for makeup. Ha ! Thru school and college. With the girls who found him funny. And laughed at his jokes. But always said no when he asked them out.
Muhammad Ali won the world boxing championship. Maybe he'd be a boxer. No. To violent. He hated violence. And what future did boxing have in India anyway ? Maybe Music . Yes. A few of his friends called him Michael Jackson already. They thought it was praise. Barry hated it. Curly hair and a dark skin, do not a Michael Jackson make !
Maybe he'd be President of the country. One day.