Image Credit: Anupsingh22

So I thought I should write something really “different” as my introductory blog. The more I thought the more clueless I got. So I decided to turn on some good old television.

“I asked you to stop like this. And you stopped like this. And I have told you about a million times now. I’ve lost my voice telling you this.”

Good enough for a Karate instructor to lose his cool on his students. But this was no Karate instructor. It was a reality show on one of the popular music channels where young girls were being trained to become models by super model mentors.

Weeks of action, melodrama, tearful eliminations, award winning speeches, nail biting finishes, back stabbing, plotting, bitching, cat fights, abuse hurling phew. Finally a winner chosen!!!

DESTINY’S CHILD!

Do not believe it?? Who else can earn all the name, fame, popularity, celebrity status, be most discussed and have paparazzi follow in just a couple of months and also for a couple of months.

Do you think reality shows are better than the daily soaps and sitcoms? Why yes or why not? I think they are all the same. For instance, there’s a reality show which asks contestants questions to which they have to give truthful answers. Each truthful answer wins them quite a lot of moolah. So how does one know these answers are true?

Apparently even before they take the hot seat the contestants are put on lie detectors and are asked 100 or more questions. A few of these are chosen to ask while the contestant is on the hot seat. So much for being truthful, the questions are all about their deep secret fantasies, sex life, cheats and broken relationships with exes, siblings and also parents.

It was great to watch someone rip open their life the first time…mmmm ! Also the second time but not more than that. The questions never change from being cheeky and sleazy. And I really do not care if someone is fantasizing about her ex while doing it with her husband.

There has never been a reality show on the lines of the sitcom Friends which can be watched every day, any number of times for years to come. I even know all the lines of every character. I have even caught myself mouthing them when the show is on. I have also consciously tried to use some of those lines in my daily life. That’s how much I love “Friends”. And I know all of you out there too.

This is not a spot to choose if reality shows are better than daily sitcoms. Television is part of us now. So much that today none of us wants to be without it. It’s not an addiction anymore. It’s a window, a mode, a galore for old and young, wise and not. I cannot even start to list what television shows us now. I will say this much about my favourite channel “Travel and Living”, I have seen more places, more people, more cuisines, more customs, more wildlife, more anything that I will ever if I went trotting around the world.

Would I like to have a few days without Television? I don’t think so. It’s a stress buster for me when I return home from work. I will not compare it to my other stress buster, A BOOK. But TV shares the pedestal with it.

I love watching Television. I’m getting back to see some more of it. This time NDTV 24×7. “How can violence in Orissa be controlled?” Any thoughts?

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