{"id":133,"date":"2008-02-07T10:36:00","date_gmt":"2008-02-07T10:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/2008\/02\/mtv-roadies-the-show.html"},"modified":"2008-02-07T10:36:00","modified_gmt":"2008-02-07T10:36:00","slug":"mtv-roadies-the-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/2008\/02\/mtv-roadies-the-show.html","title":{"rendered":"MTV Roadies – The Show"},"content":{"rendered":"

I don\u2019t watch many reality shows. However one that really has me hooked is \u201cMTV<\/a> Roadies\u201d. I\u2019ve heard that it was originally inspired from a US show of similar genre, but definitely adapts (and makes excellent TV viewing) to the desi climate. It\u2019s in it\u2019s fifth season, and comprises of 13 youngsters (18-22 from the looks of it), 6 of whom are girls. All the roadies are equipped with Hero Honda bikes, and traverse India (and internationally this season) on them, in a space of 40 days. In this time, they are subjected to various challenges to gain \u201cimmunity\u201d and prevent \u201cvote-outs\u201d. The one who survives till the end, wins.<\/p>\n

The show itself is interesting, but way more interesting are the auditions. The auditions are held in many cities \u2013 Jaipur, Delhi, Bombay etc. I haven\u2019t seen them held in Chennai or Hyderabad, or Bangalore (anyone know why ?). Sieved through group discussions, the hopefuls are interviewed one-on-one by judges Raghu Ram (also the show\u2019s producer) and Nikhil Chinappa. And it\u2019s amazing to see the large numbers that turn up, from vernacular-speaking folks from Saharanpur (he got in) to wannabe-popstars from Bombay (like Ambili \u2013 kind of surprised she wasn\u2019t selected, seemed like she\u2019d have revved things up).<\/p>\n

Aspirants turn up dressed to appear as \u201ccool\u201d as possible; I\u2019ve yet to see a female in a salwar-kameez. However there are women in shorts, and guys in muscle tees, and the ubiquitous jeans. The American flag is on many chests (Indian flag not \u201ccool\u201d ?). The \u201cnormal\u201d ones don\u2019t make the cut, since as Nikhil puts it, they aren\u2019t looking for fastest, fittest, or strongest, they\u2019re looking for characters. So, off-the-wall people welcome. Also chauvinists. Also people who seem really messed up in the head (how come there aren\u2019t more of those \ud83d\ude42 ?). And attention-seekers. And folks who wannabe famous (lots of them from the look of it).<\/p>\n

While I do envy Raghu and Nikhil (they seem to be having a grilling-good time), it does not surprise me at all, from my cushy, vantage point of 10+ years over most of the kids, how dumb most kids are at that age. I was too. I\u2019m sure some of it still persists.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s probably the time to act \u201ccool\u201d and use the f-word (thinking it\u2019s cool) and to appear to want to cheat, and lie, and want to one-up the other. That probably explains the answers the interviewees write in their Quiz sheet. The judges who are both in their 30s have it relatively easy. All they need is hind-sight (always 20-20). Recall \u201chow dumb was I then ?\u201d. These poor sods are probably just like me. Begin grilling.<\/em> Admittedly though, Raghu has more than his fair share of virtual diplomas in pop-psychology.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I don\u2019t watch many reality shows. However one that really has me hooked is \u201cMTV Roadies\u201d. I\u2019ve heard that it was originally inspired from a US show of similar genre, but definitely adapts (and makes excellent TV viewing) to the desi climate. It\u2019s in it\u2019s fifth season, and comprises of 13 youngsters (18-22 from the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"twitter_17000648_17000648":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,10,50],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-133","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-india","category-series"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"post-thumbnail":false,"sow-carousel-default":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"amodini","author_link":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/author\/admin"},"uagb_comment_info":5,"uagb_excerpt":"I don\u2019t watch many reality shows. However one that really has me hooked is \u201cMTV Roadies\u201d. I\u2019ve heard that it was originally inspired from a US show of similar genre, but definitely adapts (and makes excellent TV viewing) to the desi climate. It\u2019s in it\u2019s fifth season, and comprises of 13 youngsters (18-22 from the…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fridaynirvana.com\/fiction\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}