A Mid Summer Day's Ad

Summer Vacation.

Grandma's Place in the village or in a small town.

Sunday Afternoon.

Sweltering Heat.

Sitting on the floor right under the fan.

A Test match on DD with Hindi commentary.
Players with clothes that were 2 sizes larger.
Wills Logo with White CAPITALIZED letters on a red background.
Sachin, Azhar, Kumble, Srinath & co waging the cricket battle vs the oppositions.

The Dreaded Circle Rainbow appears on the screen:

A battle of another kind was then unleashed - the battle to lodge brands & products in your mind and find a way to your pockets.

Little did we realize back then that these would stay in our memories so long!
Thanks mainly to some of their iconic BGM's & jingles!!

A look at some of the wonderful ads that I watched on Indian TV as a kid (the 90's):

1) The classic "Hamara Bajaj" AD - we can never forget this one. Emotion packed entertainer.
It very much caught the pulse of the Common Indian then.
We can almost still remember the visuals of the guys riding the scooter and scattering the crowd of pigeons and the parsi uncle wiping his scooter squeaking clean  :)



2) Of course, one of the most endearing ads to the kids of the age : The "I am a complan girl/boy" ad :)



P.S: I'm sure Shahid and Ayeesha will agree :D

3)  Ah, and who can forget the "washing powder Nirma" one. A lot of school nicknames also resulted from this one :D

Couldn't get the old ad's video. puttin up the audio n the slightly newer one's vid:







4) And the old Cadbury ad - was almost like watching an extension of the match in the break :D :)



5) The sundrop ad - another one i distinctly remember due to the yellow tint to the entire ad, the kid's antics through the maze of food items - especially his somersault - and of course, all the delicious food :D



6) And the milky bar ad - one of the ads that actually influenced our family purchases of the time :D



7) Not exactly an ad on DD during a cricket match, but one that I remember well nevertheless:
The Old Cinthol (literally :D) ad featuring Arvind Swamy:



8) And though we were kids, this one definitely did catch our imagination :P :
Pretty Preity shaking her leg for the Liril ad:

9) Of course, no list of ads can be complete without one featuring Fevicol - they have made some of the best ads over the years. List of some of their best ads from the 90's:

(9A) The prolonged climax scene one:



(9B) The unbreakable egg one:



(9C) The "onnu rendu moonu naalu" one, a.k.a the fishing one:



(9D) The sticky shadow one a.k.a the Radio one:



10) The nescafe ad, mainly for its Jingle:



11) An ad that was part of the white revolution and one that I remember for teaching me one of my first hindi words other than "tumhara nam kya hai?" :D



12) One of the ads that I remember was repeated to the point of irritation and was around for a really long time. Memorable, nevertheless :P


13)  Another ad that had an extremely catchy jingle. Dunno if it was national or regional. Putting up the tamil version:




14) Yet another one remembered for its awesome jingle:



15) And of course, who can ever forget the "VICCO Turmeric" ad.
Generations will remember this. They have NEVER changed :D
You can still see these ads in the theatres (we often wonder how old the model in the original ad must now be :P )




A lot may have changed since then. But not the motive of them marketers -
They have had, have and will have only one mantra : "Sell. Sell. Sell"

I sometimes wonder - isn't marketing supposed to be more than just selling stuff? Point to ponder.

Cheers till the next time then!

The Common Man v2.0

The last time I checked, the common man was wearing a dhoti, a pair of specs that rest on the very end of his long nose, carrying all his belongings on the end of his crooked stick and doing his rounds on a popular newspaper in black and white. Oh, and I almost forgot his hairstyle. It is as distinct as it can get. Though the large percentage of today's balding youth (including yours truly) would make that statement extremely disputable, his angel-wing shaped tuft would definitely make him stand out, if not unique.

For those of you who haven't met this wonderful chap, you may want to visit him here .
[A large number of people who I meet these days strongly challenge the use of wikipedia. I will attempt to talk some sense into them another day]

Or for those of you who're just like me and too lazy to lift you finger and click on that link and know him a little more, this is what he looked like:

And this is what the great R.K.Laxman created him for: "For over a half of a century, the Common Man  represented the hopes, aspirations, troubles and perhaps even foibles of the average Indian, through a daily cartoon strip, "You Said It" in the ToI ".

Now, with all the hoolah-boolah (if anyone wants a definition of this, drop a comment) surrounding India becoming one of the largest economies of the world, the Indian middle-class becoming one of the world's most powerful in terms of purchasing power et al, one would think that the common man is due for a make-over.

Well, yes he is indeed due for a make-over. However, as is the case with everything in India, you can never have a single version, even if it is for a stereotype. I wonder how Laxman missed out on this thought when he started out drawing this amazing guy above. I'll lay that thought to rest as exhuming the famous dead is not exactly my idea of fun, as is this hot girl's :P phew. Another phew at the list of places she's visited:

Oh yeah, returning to the topic (yup, all guys ARE affected by ADHD irrespective of age. Esp when it comes to the final percentile of the beings of the opposite gender in terms of beauty and/or hotness).
Okay, okay, no more deviations - I promise!

Yeah, returning to our common man from the not so common woman, here is my description of common man v2.0.1 (yup, you're right - I ply my trade in that monotone of a field called IT). For this post, I wish to restrict myself to the first category of that stereotype.

Here is a description of the Common Dud with a Desi Dad as compared to his earlier counter-part, the common man.
(note that this is only a description of physical appearance. The author is in no way responsible for imagination about character & mannerisms from physical appearance):

S.No.	COMMON MAN v1.0	COMMON MAN v2.0.1
1.	Dhoti	A branded jean that has lost all color, carries particle matter from 3 different countries and is worn just below the hip so that the world can see what he consider's the best part of his body
2.	Spectacles on the fag end of long nose	Contact lenses/LASIK-corrected eyes [paid through (surgically altered) nose]
3.	Long, crooked stick	IPad 2.0 ( = Ipad1.0 + a cam )
4.	All belongings tied in a lump at the end of the stick.	No belongings. All have been sold off to buy apps for the above stick.
5.	White, angel-wing hair	As is fashion, retro-cum-modified styling with the same angel-wing hair colored in 3 colors : vivid violet, crimson red, fluorescent green ^
6.	A tell-all smile on the face	The ABCD look
7.	Grandpa’s walking shoes	TJ’S (no, that’s not the latest Zig from Reebok or Nike. You can find a brand-neutral example here. As an exercise, try expanding the acronym.)
8.	Name : Common Man	Name: Common Dud with a Desi Dad **

** it is DUD. There is no letter missing.
^ these colors , through a popular internet meme, were adopted as the national flag of ABCD's.

Yes, you guessed right - this is the punk version of Common Man v2.0.  Now for some common characteristics/mannerisms:

• This species considers smoking "weed" and doing "pot" a birthright
• Is never stable without traces of alcohol in the blood 
• Wants to be perceived that Metal/Heavy Metal is the only kind of music he has heard. 
• Is crazy about everything that is non-Indian (strictly goes ONLY by what the label says, even if it is manufactured in the gully next to his home).
• Is obsessed with the words "like" (often intentionally mis-spelled as "liek"),
  "idk" (no that ain't a terrorist org.), etc and uses them once between every two usages of these very words.
• Believes that facebook, twitter and porn alone make up the entire world wide web.

Well the list can go on and on and on. But for want of space and time, it has to stop there. And I'm pretty sure you get the idea!!

Yes, there is the Common DUD-ette with Desi Dad too and no, not all Common DUD(-ette)s with Desi Dads are gay/lesbo.

If someone (with the skills of course) is willing to take the task up of drawing v2.0.1(male), then a detailed description of v2.0.1(female), v2.1.1(male) and v2.1.1(female) are immediately in the offing.

Also, there is a special category called the 'IIx'ian who believes he is of v2.0.1. 

A description of all these sub-species will follow in the coming weeks, nevertheless.

Cheerio,

The stand-up Indianomist.