Kuch Kuch Hota Hai

I needed a quick fix, some chewing gum for the brain and reality car crash or soap schmaltz was not going to satisfy that craving. One of those nights following a day of overload on the internet led to a volley of inevitable channel hopping. I refused to succumb to the evil lure of 'What Katy Did Next?' or 'Sir' Louis Theroux's dry take on US televangelism. Game, set and match point came in the form of the classic Bollywood film; 'Kuch Kuch Hota Hai'. With a silent prayer for English subtitles, I bravely entered the world of dramatic Bollywood romance.

With preconceived ideas of sugary scripting that would make diabetics baulk, I sat back and assumed the role of a perfect neutral umpire. Set in a high school in India, my initial impressions were that it was a crossbreed of Disney's 'Hannah Montana' and 'High School Musical' as I cursed the film choice repeatedly. Granted the actors appeared to be the jewels of Bollywood's casting but I felt an overwhelming urge to flick that switch as a flood of yellow pom poms filled the screen.

I watched as two students, Rahul and Anjali who are best of friends share corny one-liners together. Anajali cannot let Rahul know that in spite of being his ladette best friend, she is totally in love with him. Enter every woman's nightmare, the beautiful, feminine 'woman of Rahul's present dreams', Tina. Rahul falls in love with her then Anjali realises how she feels about Rahul but it seems too late and she quits college to forget him. With half an eye on the remote and the sheer stubborn willingness to see what the fuss was about, I kept my eye on the game.

With a sudden change in the film's direction, from the frivolous cartoon plot to excellent crafted scripting, I was hooked. Tina and Rahul marry; have a baby named Anjali and then Tina dies during childbirth. The hook was that Tina had left some letters and on each of Anjali's birthdays from the age of five she is given a letter to read. The letters explain her mother's desires for her but in the last letter Tina explains her namesake and tells her that she noticed the older Anjali's pure love for Rahul. Rahul had refused to move on and remarry but her mother tells her to help her father reclaim the real love he let go. The story continues as young Anjali and her grandmother continue to search for the older Anjali. She is found but has to follow the path of an arranged marriage and is about to be wed. At the ceremony, her husband-to-be steps aside to let the path of fate take its place. The Bollywood illuminations then began as the screen became alight with fireworks in the night sky and with Hindu gods who were looking over destiny as the Rahul and Anjali are bought together. I became a trembling, tormented, sobbing wreck as I vainly tried to gain composure by wiping the pain of non-waterproof mascara from my continuing leaking eyes. That night was when I became a true member of the Bollywood sect.