Abba

You know what, I love Abba-now don’t you worry, its ok if we don't have too many things in common! Abba's tunes are nice and so vigorous! The group's two female voices complement each other so well-as if their voices were a package-deal from God, as if he hadn't conceived them individually but as a whole. However my original motivations for liking the band were different. Then (when I was in my first year of college and was getting introduced to western pop) theirs were the only lyrics which I could decipher easily. Added to that, the girl I liked a lot liked Abba a lot and I soon took a fancy. Hey, I am talking about stuff that happened some eight years ago.

When I think of those (gosh am I old enough for this usage!) days I am kinda overwhelmed at the rate the world has changed. My favorite illustration for this change is the following: When I was introduced to Abba by Rupa (ah, no rhyme intended!) I copied down a whole notebook of their lyrics by hand. Can you believe that! That notebook of lyrics was a legacy passed down to Rupa by her sister. Her sister had put together the lyrics along with her friends in the Church choir when one of them had stumbled upon a treasure trove of published lyrics in a second-hand book shop.

I had to resort to a lot of sleight to get that dear family treasure from Rupa’s cupboard to my cycle-carrier. Like letting my fingers over her smooth cheeks once and vouching for the efficacy of her Fair and Lovely and convincing her I was a die-hard fan of Abba by reciting fully, ‘Does your mother know…’. She had on that occasion played back that song and so many of my favorites in her own voice. Of course her mom did not know. Later, in that year’s summer-break, I transferred those songs from her delicate note book and its brown pages.

Does it all sound so quaint? It would, it would! That was the time I could still take pride in going around in my cycle and the internet was ‘a something called internet’. It was a new, strange creature just prowling the Indian shores. A year later I visited an internet cafe for the first time in my life on a free pass. I cut two morning classes in college and visited this parlor with our gang-Rupa wasn’t with us then. I was not greatly impressed with the Internet and obviously so. It hardly had any of the usual trappings-I didn't know what Yahoo! was, I didn't have a mail account, I wasn’t exposed to many of those personals sites I would later visit with wide-eyed fascination, and what the hell, there was no Google!! So it was like leaving a kid to explore a sex toys shop. It hardly meant anything to me.

So much water has flown thence! Rupa is long gone and settled in New Zealand, while the Internet has become my bread and butter. And cajoling anyone for lyrics doesn't anymore sound a plausible excuse for anything.