Ten days ago, I stood in the line for tickets at Bandra station and noticed that the guy in front of me had these lines printed calligraphy-style on his T-shirt:

Stone Dead Forever
Auttgart Sineers
Galaxy Rainers
Bengrance — Witteilingen.
Being Outstanding in a Complex Society Revolution

I know, I know. You feel envious that you weren’t there to read these words for yourself. Believe me, I felt privileged.

But on Sunday (Feb 10) at the Kala Ghoda Festival, I noticed this on a T-shirt that passed by:

Being Outstanding in a Complex Society

Now that has to rank as a seriously improbable coincidence. In years of being a T-shirt slogan watcher, I’ve never seen the same wacky slogan twice. Here it’s happened within ten days. Naturally, I wonder if this is some popular quote, sort of like “Don’t tase me, bro”.

Is it?

***

I note Sakshi has put up a delightful note about Something Relevant, the band that played on Sun afternoon. If she took that photograph that accompanies her writeup, she must have been standing right next to me — because that’s precisely the view I had of the performance. So Sakshi, why didn’t you say hi?

Why didn’t I say hi?

Missed audience greetings apart, Something Relevant is an astonishingly versatile and accomplished band of musicians. Though they made us wait just too long with various sound checks and tunings, the music they turned out was — I gotta admit — worth the wait. They began with The Rolling Stones anthem, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want”, but that was just a starting point. The song turned into a 15 minute set that, in turn, showcased each member of the band, singing or playing different riffs to the same basic rhythm and key. Stuart on bass did an outstanding rap-like solo that had us all in rap-tures, the accent and words down pat. The two other vocalists, one on lead, did a back and forth sort of sawaal-jawaab routine that worked better and better as it got more and more frantic and energetic. The two saxes, keyboards and drums all hammered out intricate, expert solos too.

The band went on to play “Tomorrow I’ll be a Working Man” and “Horn OK Please” (”They don’t let you go/And all you can see/Is Horn OK Please“). I had to leave, so I don’t know if they got to the song they mention on their website that’s one of my long-time faves, “Sweet Home Alabama” (well, they appear to have changed the name to “Sweet Home Mumbai”, but still).

Turns out I know one of the sax players, Amar Sukhi. On the phone later, he told me that when he joined the band, he immediately raised its average age — then 22 — by several years. Here’s something the band doesn’t know — I have vague designs of seeing if they can be the vehicle to realize my dream of playing in a rock band before I die. If that ever happens, the average age will take one more leap. (Upward, as if you didn’t know).

***

Car rally in the morning. We got our first inkling of it when the cab I was in with a young cousin once-removed was overtaken by a bright orange Lamborghini with Gautam Singhania at the wheel. My cousin o-r scrabbled frantically for his camera, and while he was doing so, our cab was overtaken by a bright red Ferrari with I don’t know who at the wheel. By this time cousin o-r was nearly tearing his hair out in excitement, then hung out of the window getting photographs of these two low beasts just ahead of us.

But they didn’t join the rally. In the middle of the festival were these several older, “classic” or “vintage” cars — a Vauxhall, a Rolls, a Mini Morris, a Hudson, etc. The American ones long like blimps, the British ones short and stubby. The Hudson had two stickers on its windshield, one advertising VCCCP and the other VCCCI. That’s “Vintage and Classic Car club of Pakistan” and “… of India”, respectively.

I liked that.

***

From one of the art installations where a large painting of a woman in a bikini top stopped cousin o-r and me in our tracks, I learned that “Oniomania” is a word for a “shopping addiction disorder.”

Hmm. And I thought it meant the disorder that’s inherent in shopping for onions.

Nearby are a couple of men with a table, some bottles of paint and a small mound of rice. The “Name on Rice” dudes, always fascinating to watch. The way the guy chooses an appropriate grain, and then swiftly and surely paints your name onto it, is breathtaking.

This day, I thought I’d test him with a longish made-up name. He charged me sixty bucks, and did it with easy aplomb. Small smile as he handed it over for me to see and watched me goggle in astonishment.

Hell, I should have really tested him. I should have given him Warnakulasuriya Patabendige Ushanta Joseph Chaminda Vaas. Or my college buddy’s relative, Malladi Venkata Rama Subramanya Jaya Vardhana Vara Prasad. Or my friend Arshanapalayam Srinivasa Raghava Chari Dorai Swamy Kayar Chakravarti Sanjay Sampath Iyengar.

But no doubt he’d have done those with aplomb too. As it stands instead, if you go by Kanakadurga Tirthraj Govindarajulu, I have a grain of rice with your name on it, attached to a keyring. Hand over sixty bucks and it’s yours.

***

At the Elphinstone College Canteen, taking our time over medu-vadas and dosas and hakka noodles, we tremble at the stern admonition on the wall: “Timepass Not Allowed.”