Articles

Watching TV in Pakistan

Published by TV Explore on April 11, 2009

I’ve just bought an expensive TV set -one of those Sony LCD models that hang on the wall like a blackboard in a classroom -on the advice of a friend who is a TV addict. In comparison, my previous TV looks like a massive wooden box, like a large, old radio of the fifties era, with glass glued on the front. My avid TV-watching friend convinced me to part with this ten-year-old collectable antique to improve my viewing experience.

The only thing that appeared on my old TV set was news, news and more of the same old news. There were multiple news tickers covering the lower portion of the screen on every channel, regardless of the programme currently being aired. The channels had the audacity to flash red “breaking news” blobs even during cellular phone commercials, the only comical relief provided by these channels. You can well imagine my frustration from the fact that I had to resort to switching over to PTV on many an occasion.

When you live alone, rapidly moving to the far side of middle age, with friends who are either deceased or approaching senility, and with no one to talk, your television is the only company you are likely to have. Of course, there is the option of finding a female companion. The only problem with replacing a TV with a wife is that you cannot switch off a wife after you have had enough of her continuous blabbering. Why? bcoz they go on chattering even during power outages! Also, a TV comes handy when you have boring relatives visiting you and the gossip reports covering the extended family turn to reminiscing about the better side of the miserable dead.

So I took the plunge and spent a small fortune on the advice of the ‘expert.’ I planned to make up for this loss of money by unsubscribing to my regular newspapers. Besides, they print what appeared on TV last night anyway. Therefore, having a new TV and also buying a newspaper makes no sense. It is just reliving the previous night’s monotony.

I excitedly switch on the new TV. All I see is what was there on my old Box TV, only the pictures are bigger and clearer, amplifying human flaws, which further adds to my agony. I shouldn’t have listened to the ‘adviser’ and tried out the validity of his claim on someone else’s slim TV before parting with old TV that provided me with an alternative to the evening walks every time I needed to change a channel. “Idiots don’t grow horns on their heads. They just gather ‘advisers’ around themselves,” (political pun not intended). My investment in the new gizmo was akin to a regime change that soon dashes the hopes of the common man who had expected miracles to happen.

There appear to be more channels than TVs in the country. However, it is hard to tell one channel from the other. I keep flipping the channels continuously throughout the evening looking for entertainment. There is nothing but news, news and more of the same old news. Political leaders emitting gas makes it to the ‘breaking news’ ticker. Bomb blasts and the resulting mayhem only get a passing reference. It is an everyday routine and, therefore, not news anymore. Besides, it is happening far away from Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi, the cities that make up the real Pakistan.

As for the NWFP and Baluchistan, the two provinces are to us today as East Pakistan was way back in the past. Who cares what happens there! They are backward and, hence, worthless. Our military is doing a great job to bring them in line with the thinking of the real Pakistan-yup, Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi!

The media had a whale of a time with the lawyers’ movement. Now that all’s quiet on every front, the scene looks like the day after a funfair. This is negligence on our part as a nation to put the jobs of cameramen, commentators and newscasters at risk. They thrive on crises. Let us join hands in appealing to the saintly trio of Zardari, Rehman and Taseer to pick issues with His Holiness at the Vatican on Raiwind Road, and the rest of the political apostles. This lull before the next storm is driving us, the news addicts, just plain crazy. It is pitiful to watch our distinguished media men stoop to the level of focusing on problems concerning ordinary citizens.

Though I am fully aware of our obsession with the verbose, the abundance of Talk Shows is too much for me to stomach. Every opinionated reporter/hack with a suit and tie, along with a chirpy ragdoll, are hired to play hosts. The host sits there smugly, provoking shouting matches among the jobless representatives of various political parties. It is after endlessly watching ‘talk shows’ that one begins to wish for a ‘Shut-up Show’. I push the ‘mute’ button and laugh my head off at their demeanour and gestures. Try it-the debaters will appear like drunken clowns strapped to chairs.

If you are a bored housewife with no one around to talk to, then watching the cookery shows during the daytime is the only option. The hostess comes up with recipes of foreign dishes which not even the natives of the named country have heard of. You can tell from the way she is made up and dressed that Begum Sahiba has never seen the inside of a kitchen before. Let’s see her make a simple chapatti to establish her credentials. Ladies, never try out those recipes. If you do then your husbands lengthy ‘business meetings’ may turn into night-long marathons, and may come home only to shave and change clothes.

With cricket wrapped up for a long time, we don’t have much to watch on sports channels. Religious channels however, are quite enlightening provided you are proficient in the Arabic language. The dilemma arises when azaans from the nearby mosques simultaneously start blaring from the loud speakers. What do you do? Lower the TV’s volume or close the windows? (If you took more than ten seconds to figure this out, I would advise you not to discuss religion in public. Your weak knowledge and vague concepts could get you in real trouble).

How to tell whether you are watching a Pakistani or Indian soap? Simple: if the role of an overbearing father is played by a man in his twenties with a white moustache glued on the upper lip then it has to be a Pakistani channel. The other telltale sign is a character turning his back to the other players and walking towards the camera. Of course, the rest of the characters have to stand motionless while the long monologue, meant for them but delivered to the audience, is over. Repeated bangs and a giddying montage of short zoom-in shots mean that the much-awaited climax to the story has finally happened — surprise!

The Indian plays usually revolve around flirtatious bosses or bitchy mothers-in-law. Don’t try to flip to the Indian channels if you are looking for comedy programs. They are even more pathetic. However, their dancing in the traditional filmi style is quite scintillating for the brief attires the extras are made to wear.

If you want to listen to music, better go get the favourites recorded on a CD. Why sit and watch our young engineers and doctors making fools of themselves by aping Western performers?

My favourite is a channel where Punjabi stage plays are shown around the clock. The plays have no plots and poorly designed sets. The dialogues are made up of curse words, and the action is limited to jumping over the items placed on the stage and slapping one another in the face. A girl appears, every now and then, in dubious attire with vulgar dancing moves. The actors, at times, engage in direct dialogue with the members of the audience. These plays are unbearably coarse, crude and disgusting. Yet, everybody in the audience and on the stage is enjoying himself. That, to me, sums up what we, as a nation, are all about.

Written by: Sarwar Sukhera, The Nation

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