Invasive siblings

My sister will tell you that this isn't just a thing of the past but a regular occurrence even today. This simply means that we aren't done growing up.

 

The Shark Podcast: Episode 2

 

Bob does not think it is right to complain about masks being an inconvenience. There are people actually struggling to breathe because there isn't any oxygen in many hospitals in India. So when people outside are still taking things lightly, it makes us wonder if our apathy deserves a wake-up call. 

Shark Week 2017

Last year I attempted to draw a bunch of cartoons inspired by the episode titles and that was kind of fun. Even though they don't air here at the same time nor do I have a bunch of shark freaks to shark it out, I thought I'd do another series of episode themed cartoons. Even though the Michael Phelps one is probably the most talked about, I thought I'd start with Great White Shark Serial Killer lives.

#1
It seems as if they continue to believe/hope that such titles captivate more people than one simply capturing the beauty and splendour of the Great White. It's stuff like this that creates headlines describing the basking shark as "terrifying". So here's my cartoon. Don't miss the eye roll.

#2 - Shark-Croc showdown
My favourite part of this is the "leather cleaner". It's those little things that make a difference.

#3 - Alien Sharks
Like how I made the space ships look like skates and rays? It's things like this that make me such an awesome cartoonist.

#4 - Sharks in the city
The episodes focus on NYC and LA but the title obviously is meant to remind you of "Sex and the city" right? So, voila! This was probably my favourite one to draw and I loved how it turned out.

#5 - The Lost Cage
They did make it sound like mysterious lost treasure, after all.

#6 - African Shark Safari
See how I "subtly" do a Madagascar reference?
(This is actually meant to be #7 but there's a slight glitch with the original #6. I'll explain later, perhaps.)

Resolutions and solutions

I put off making resolutions for New Year until perhaps a week or two after the initial feeling of obligation to do such things passes. Even then, I'm hoping to simply create new habits for the year. Like being less cynical, make a lot more drawings and do some new activity. Well, good luck to me!

Bazinga hug!

I was going to have the last panel say "Bazinga" in hopes that 'The Big Bang Theory' will sue me and send Jim Parsons to deliver the notice. The Shark would hug him for sure. (I hope)

Better things to do - Part 1

There are times (oftentimes) when we aren't as quick to respond to social calls and excuses are made when we can't make it for a reunion or family gathering or even reply to a voicemail/email/text message/ any of the zillion communication methods we have these days. The standard excuse is that you've been busy and usually people accept that because they use it too. However, sometimes some people actually ask you what you were actually up to. They come to learn that "I've been really busy" is the socially less offensive way of saying "there were times we could have caught up but I had better things to do".
Of course, it's good to sometimes actually take the time to be social so that you don't end up being a sociopath but it's also good not to get offended if someone would just rather read comic books.

I say "part 1" because I can think of many more and maybe if people sent in their excuses, I'd use a few of those too.

Attack of the Sneeze!

"Sinus: The Revenge", "Night of The Hay Fever", "When noses twitch" - these would probably be the only kinds of horror movies I could handle.
I hope this above scenario happens to everyone who wants to jump out and scare me.

Say 'No' to stupidity and colourism!

Even though we don't like to admit it and like to keep pretending that we're a country of mosaic culture united in diversity, India is one of the biggest practitioners of apartheid in the world. There will be a multitude of people who will get all "offended" or "angered" by my statement and may get all hostile but that's how we tend to avoid issues. We get angry at those who point out the issue than at the issue itself. Whoever established this mindset has very conveniently allowed things like discrimination, low self-esteem and exploitation to go unchecked.
How else can a country with one billion skin tones continue to be the largest market for skin whitening creams? And a country where people actually believe these products work! You cannot change your skin colour from a deeper shade of brown to a paler version of pink. It just cannot happen. No cosmetic product can do that. Maybe if you tried acid?
There are people with actual skin problems who are in need of proper skin care; and in India, sun screen is probably a better product to sell. I'm shocked that they could package a mix of sun screen and bleach and sell it as a "fairness cream" - how blatantly offensive is that? Whatever happened to respect and allowing people to succeed based on skill rather than skin? At what point does skin colour go from being "successful" to not? Is there some logical cutoff shade with a pantone code perhaps?
"Dark is beautiful" is a campaign that talks about this discrimination against skin colour. They are currently campaigning against irresponsible advertising and propaganda that promote the idea that your skin colour determines how successful you are to be. Please sign the petition here if you believe that India needs to get over this so-called hangover we're still suffering from after The Raj. It's been over 60 years. Move forward.

To view the commercial click here - it's sad when such influential celebrities promote such an idea. This ad agency needs some real creativity and some integrity.

The "Social Obligation Smile"

About five years ago, I wrote a blog post titled "The 'Social Obligation Smile'". I'd written the title down in my sketch notebook to remind myself to someday do a sketch about it. Re-reading my old post shows me just how cynical and sarcastic I used to be (I'm definitely mellowing down). However, I still believe that this is a highly useful skill in societies/cultures where social interactions are strangely superficial and yet extremely fundamental.
Also, this could probably help the sharks with their public image, right?

It's offensive to be offended!

Is it just me or do people get offended by more and more things every passing day? Most of which could be just ignored or laughed away. Is it also a coincidence that way more people are becoming "intolerant" of various food stuff - allergies that were not all that common some years ago? It's really weird that we get all offended about cartoons drawn decades ago that included all sorts of people groups and showed them in a humorous light but we seem accepting of kids getting stripped of their innocence younger and younger. It all seems rather silly.

Everything? Like, forever.

Well, "gross" does also mean "total", "whole" and "entire".
We're a needy race. We always have one craving or another and there are tons of things the world has to offer that can satisfy the need for a moment or two. Then we overdo it and those things suffocate us. It just gets way more emotional when people use other people to fill up the emptiness. Eventually someone smothers someone or the one finds that the other isn't enough (because on top of being needy we also can become quite discontent quickly). It does make one rather cynical when one expects fulfillment from other humans, doesn't it? Even sharks have no use for them because they apparently taste bad.
However, in the grand scheme of things, we probably will see that we must do our best for each other and help those who are down look up rather than look to us. Otherwise, you may end up with a stalker.

Genuinely Fake thanks to Facebook!

Yep, I know. We all do it. Facebook has made it so much easier to be fake. But be careful - when we rely on Facebook too much for our fakeness, we may forget how to be fake in real life and end up in some awkwardness. 

Honestly though (yes, really), it is probably easier to display emotion on Facebook and it is probably better to miss people when they're far away. We just sometimes prefer to keep missing people than to actually have them around. Hmm, it is a wonder that I have any friends at all.

Sharks & Sarees: The new fad

This was done for a friend who owns this cool saree shop, The Silkworm Boutique. I promised to do a comic and then was stuck with wondering how on Earth I'd combine sharks and sarees. The answer is simple: just combine them. 

Since sarees have to be colourful, I had to colour it in. I picked a common combination - mustard & red. Obviously it's a good thing I didn't go into the saree designing business. After I coloured in the saree, everything else looked pale. 

ps - My intuos makes drawing so much easier except when it comes to the human. I really dislike drawing humans. 

pps - I usually spell it as "sari" but only when I searched for "saree" did I find some great reference images. 

Movie theatre venting #5762 - They're probably just being considerate!

It's been a while since I vented about public entertainment spots and how consistently annoying they are. There hadn't been any improvement since my last post so obviously these people need a bit more persuading.

I honestly think that maybe the above explanation is why people do what they do at movie theatres. Either this or they're out to get me personally. It's happened at 95% of the movies I've watched here and the remaining 5% had people cheering constantly because they forgot for a second that they were in fact inside a theatre and not saving the world along with Batman or Spiderman or whoever.

The script I was trying to capture (without revealing too much) in the first panel was "The Hunger Games". There were these men sitting behind us who simply had to repeat every single thing that was happening on screen. It didn't make any sense as to why one would have to describe something to someone who was there too. That's when it hit me - this has to be the only feasible explanation. If not: my dear fellow countrymen, please try not to be so irritating in public.

Again, if any of you (who really are challenged in these functions) are offended by this, I am sorry. But the shark still doesn't care. It thinks you ought to stay home and watch a movie and have all the loud conversations you want.

ps - my last two strips were digitally done entirely! yay!

And the #1 cause for over-population is...

There are some "auspicious" months in a year when most households get flooded with wedding invites. People bring them with an odd sort of apologetic smugness with the compulsive need to ask us when it's our turn. And every time we get a new invite, my mother sighs because she probably feels that we're like some sort of rebels or freaks of society refusing to pay wedding dues or something, wondering when the revolution will end so that we too can shove these cards in people's faces. 

I, on the other hand, look at the sheer quantity of them and think "If there's ever a society in the world that probably needs to NOT get married and procreate, it's this one". 

Everyone seems almost confounded to see a zillion people at the cinema, malls, parks, beaches but they still continue to play out the above dialogues regularly in their lives!  [okay, so I may have exaggerated a teensy bit on the above scenarios]. 

I'm sorry if this offends anyone (I don't think The Shark cares though). 

Completely fair?

This is the second strip I did for the "Beauty beyond colour" campaign by Women of Worth. (My earlier strip can be found here. )

Sometimes I wonder why the Great White shark is called that when it is white only on its lower side. I guess it's because the poor little seal sees only a flash of white before it becomes a sealwich. hahaha.

Okay, onto the issue at hand.. most adverts today are so utterly nonsensical that I think this sort of lying needs to be made illegal. "Microbeads", "oil pearls", "Active fresh power cells" and such fictional ingredients go into consumer products telling people that their very real problems will be taken care of if they use their miraculous products. 

They can't even truly fix damaged hair or make people age backwards or cure dandruff. So how did they manage to convince people that their products can change really dark skin into shades lighter? Don't they feel bad when they see people buy fairness creams/masks/sunscreens in hopes that they'll become more popular or super stars? 

Why can't they tell people to aim for healthy (not "healdhy") looking skin instead? (Didn't we learn in school at some stage that the melanin in our skin protects us from harmful UV rays?). There are people out there who find different shades/ features attractive and that's why it is UNfair to treat certain shades as beauty norms. 

How about we first demand that ad slots not be more than 2 minutes? These companies seem to have enough money to throw at airtime and don't care about my our TV watching time. 

How to sound wisdomous

I hope I don't offend any wise people. I should probably stop talking in that case. 

(But I do think some "wise quotes" just sound that way because of how they are said and not because it's some radical new thought or piece of advice).

Fairly Lovely Ad

My friends at the Women of Worth (WOW) have this campaign on called "Dark is beautiful - beauty beyond colour" and asked me to do a sketch for it. India is odd in many ways - one of them is that despite being of one race, we're all of different shades. Instead of flaunting this variety filled shade card, society has (as usual) found a way to make something nasty out of it. Numerous people are differentiated and discriminated not by their personalities or skills but by something that is not in their hands. 

Although, both men and women face this ordeal, I must admit that it is more strongly felt by women. I mean, women who are one shade darker than almost-caucasian are termed as "having less colour" (here, the less colour you have, the darker you are - yes, it doesn't make sense which is why this is still an issue). And yet, men who are darker than dark are hailed as superstars and heroes. It's okay for extremely dark-skinned men (also now termed as "wheatish")  to demand for "fair" brides but rarely the other way round. 

Anyway, the point is not to say one is beautiful and the other is not or that one is better than the other (more about the campaign here). But I must say that it is ridiculous to continue to believe that one can do things better or become more popular if only they became shades lighter. First of all, it's not really possible with fairness creams and second, if you're going to have attitude issues even if you're Snow White, you're going to lose your job and your popularity.

Personally, I'm extremely bothered by the distastefully ghastly fairness cream adverts out there that basically tell people that creative agencies must think they're so stupid to buy this crap. I know (thanks to ad agency experience) that these products don't work and that they simply play on people's insecurities. If you want to use them anyway for their advanced skin healing technology, go ahead but don't do it because you think that guy/girl will like you if you do. 

ps - You can also check out the Facebook page for "Dark is Beautiful"

pps - Don't miss the "Fairly Lovely" product. I won't be surprised if a fairness cream company actually made an ad like this.

Anti-social vs Unfriendly

This is me justifying my statement "I was being Anti-social not unfriendly. There's a difference." Not many seemed to see that there's a difference. Now you do.

Public message #2: Driving & Road rules

There are a lot of things that annoy me about the way we treat our country. Like the lack of respect for public property, other people, natural beauty and resources. It's as if we Indians have started settling for less than what we ought to be. I was on the train recently and there were cockroaches everywhere and no one seemed to be bothered. People piss on our roads and spit everywhere as if they are unaware that people usually spit on something they are disgusted with. 

Does India come with a big sign that says "Spit here"? (I need to do a doodle for that!)

How did we reach that state of mind where we allow our quality of life to be this pathetic?

Anyway, as I was saying, a lot of things about our attitudes annoy me. One of them is the absolutely stupid and unbelievably disrespectful way we treat our roads and driving.  I mean, some of them actually are in a hurry to be organ donors! (Not an original line - stole it from my dad). Since I use my comic to vent, here goes. 

I'm not insulting India, just us Indians. We need to stop insulting India. How's this for a belated Republic day message?

ps - I don't know how the shark suddenly got to teach as if in a classroom. I thought the glasses would make it look smart!