In the summer of ’93, the Jamaican reggae group Inner Circle released Sweat — a song that till date remains one of their best-selling singles...

Girl I want to make you sweat

A la la la la long, a la la la la long long li long long long...

The heat is well and truly on.

In the sultry April of 2009, it could easily become the anthem song of our city.

Trust me, I am not about to deliver a socio-political address on global warming. I am not Al Gore and I certainly have more hair on my head than a certain Dr Rajendra Pachauri!

When Glenn Frey stopped flying with The Eagles and sang The Heat Is On in the mid-Eighties, little did we know about the trauma we were about to face 25 years later.

The fact that we still haven’t melted away simply proves we can take the rough with the smooth.

Sultry Days is no longer a book written by Shobhaa ‘what’s-your-age’ De. It’s an experience that we share skin-to-skin. Almost all of a sudden, ‘how are you’ seems to be a statement too tame for a greeting. ‘Are you fried?’ sounds more appropriate, instead.

Quite obviously, Willis Haviland Carrier is the man you want to thank a thousand times over. Quite rightly called The Father of Cool, his are the brains that help us keep a cool head in modern times. If worshipping the now cruel and savage sun god is still so very much in vogue for most Indians, a “Carrier-saab ka mandir” should have been on the agenda long, long ago. After all, the man who gave the world its first air-conditioner is no mere mortal and surely deserves this gratitude.

Every time I use a cab devoid of the supreme luxury of air-conditioning, I swear to myself never to have tandoori chicken again.

RUSH OF HEAT TO THE HEAD

The flavour of the season is undoubtedly the elections but breathing heavily down its neck is most certainly the killing heat.

The candidates woefully wish they had shed some of that lard from their bodies earlier. The torture of the padayatras to woo the junta is truly telling on the health of our netajis. Imagine all that jazz for just a few votes more… (Bravo! Neta Ho To Aisa!)

Even their “right hands” and “left hands” seem to know the “woo-do” act, constantly urging their money-banks to step out of their AC vehicles. “Dada, koshto kore kindly ekhane neme jaan. Oder shongeo ektu gheme chaan. Syaar, this is the best vote strategy! Go forward. Embrace their perspiring bodies! Wipe them dry! Be with them! Be like them! Syaar, just sweat it out now anyhow, for five years of air-conditioned comfort later!”

And in case you hear loose talk from your favourite candidate, have a heart for the poor soul. Blame it on the heat. Matha gorom is a popular concept with us Bengalis.

Times when you wished there were less cars on the road. Times when you wished you had planted more trees. Times when you wished you had checked… (STOP! STOP! STOP! Intruder Alert! I’m beginning to “Gore” you to death.)

BEING JOHN "MALL" KOVICH

The producers and multiplex owners might be at war with each other but that certainly shouldn’t stop you from taking in dollops of Anjan Dutt’s Darjeeling saga one more time. Never mind the story. If you’ve really got nothing to do, just hang out with a chick, catch a flick and do justice to that body you got as a one-time gift from God.

Back in office, don’t you dare expect a raise in these times. And if you really can’t bear your boss, simply “beer” yourself on Park Street in the name of the father, the sun and the holy ‘spirit’! After all, what else are client meetings for?

WEATHER WITH YOU

On a lighter and purely nostalgic note, I really miss Rajendranath Goldar (of Alipore weather office fame) and his “accurate” forecasts. When Goldar said “thundershowers”, we blissfully left home without our umbrellas. In moments such as these, technology is a little too harsh. People take their jobs a bit too seriously, perhaps they become a bit too “politically correct”. Pity, they spoil the fun.

Waiting for the rains to shower their mercy, I reluctantly move in to the super-hot floors of a Tollygunge studio to see an extremely enthusiastic lady walking up to a popular actor and telling him, “Sir, autograph please. I am your greatest fan...”

As the star smilingly obliges with a pen that suddenly refuses to write, I silently comment on his behalf, “Wish you were my AC, darling!”