Man is said to be god’s best creation, and god not only created man but also his destiny, as some would say. But some of us completely disagree with this and feel that man makes his own destiny. If seen practically, it is very true but at the same time man cannot always live the way he desires to. But some of us are not able to accept this bitter reality, especially when we are dissatisfied of the way we are or when we suffer from inferiority complex or when we idolize some people or a particular lifestyle and want to live that way and that is exactly when we hide our real selves behind a mask of FAKENESS, using the art of “IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT’’.
You must be wondering what this I.M. is all about. Well let me explain it to you. In our daily lives we come across people we know and don’t know and we make certain assumptions about their likes, dislikes and expectations in our minds and when we start portraying ourselves according to the way they would think is cool, hiding our real selves behind the mask of what we think is the ‘idol’, it is called I.M. in technical terms or FAKING in layman’s language. However, I.M. must not be understood in a negative way because in professional life it is the key to success but it gets a little wacky and also calls for trouble when used on a daily basis and that too with those whom we
meet everyday.
There are different reasons as to why the D.U. students idolize, follow or copy the Bollywood icons but what I feel is that we find them fascinating because our BOLLYWOOD STARS ARE THE REAL GURUS OF I.M. The queen of fake accent and piercing laughter - AISHWARYA RAI; our super skinny plastic doll - SHILPA SHETTY; the king of unnatural acting - SHAHRUK KHAN; an the so called boy-next-door - RANBIR KAPOOR, well if you are in DU I don’t think you can find a better reason to worship them!!
A year in college and I know exactly whom all to award with the sash of ‘FAKE-O-FREAK’ [THOSE WHO LOVE TO FAKE]. Girls screaming insanely while hugging their girlfriends and the moment that friend is gone the first thing she will say is "DID YOU SEE WHAT SHE WAS WEARING?” or “I HATED HER PERFUME". People waiting for MUSOC auditions and you find a group of guys fooling around with their guitars and then on stage they end up singing, albeit dissonantly, your favourite Linkin Park song, after which you decide never to listen to that song again. Then you see girls with tones of makeup on their face complimenting each other (well let me tell you girls rarely compliment each other but even if they do, the other should be smart enough to rush to the common room and check herself). This is not all, there is a variety of ways in which people fake. Let me share with you a small incident about this girl I knew (I call her the DRAMA QUEEN). She can fake it to the extent that it gets unbearable and the worst part is she thinks that its super cute and that no one can understand that she is fake!!! However, in reality a person even with a rat’s brain can make out what is she up to and trust me to being with such people is a torture of 3rd degree.
Anyways getting back to our story, August is the month when the monsoons shower its blessing upon us Delhi-ites. I always felt so happy to be born in this month, not only because I love rain but also because it is the month of the jungle king: the lion or the Leo. I along with two more people were a part of this Leo gang and so we thought of celebrating our birthdays together and guess what, the ‘Drama Queen’, the lead of our story was one of the Leos. I was to celebrate my birthday with her!!!
19th August, 2010 - It was raining heavily but I was in no mood to postpone the party, so we decided to go ahead with our plan of going to a pub in G.K. Everyone had a hard time reaching there, especially our ‘Drama Queen’ who almost fell in a manhole while managing her stilettos and her skirt, well she was the one who was crazy about going to a pub (though even I was extremely excited as I had never been to a pub throughout my school life). By the time we reached G.K. our tummies were growling and had started making us feel like real Leos. However, even after spending Rs. 2000 at Pizza Hut our tummies were dissatisfied and for once they wanted to yell out "Why the hell did you get us here when you knew the budget was low?”. It wasn’t our fault because our Queen wouldn’t listen to anyone because she thought that she was too posh to go to some reasonable place to eat and too insensitive to realize that our birthday budget was something around 5000-6000 bucks. We all were still hungry; cursing the Queen in our minds but at the same time trying to cheer up thinking of the excitement and the fun that awaited us in the pub and to our good luck that entry at the pub was free that day. Thanking our stars, we got inside the pub. The loud music and the ambiance had already made us high and we girls were just waiting to get on the dance floor but the guys as usual could not enjoy without the GOLDEN DRINK (beer). As soon as the drinks were placed on the table, our ‘Drama Queen’ rushed to take a sip of it. However the moment this golden drink rolled down her food pipe she shouted, "Yuck!!!! It Tastes Pathetic.” We all couldn’t control ourselves and started laughing. However, our laughter was full of sarcasm.
After all this she joined us on the dance floor, I forgot to tell u she loved dancing and was in the misconception of being better than the leading Bollywood choreographers. Hence she couldn’t bear being rejected by our Dancesoc and had cried so hard that she was called back home by her parents so that some counseling could be done. I still cannot forget the way she danced that day. It looked like she was fully drunk (but dude, who gets drunk after taking just a sip of beer?) She then started dancing as Mallika Sherawat did on the song "MAIN TALLI HO GAYI". Suddenly she burst into tears and had to be escorted to the washroom several times (so that a scene would not be created). But how could that be possible with someone who loves to stay in the limelight until all the guys present at the pub got extra interested in her (that was exactly what she wanted). Most of them had crossed their fingers in the hopes that she was drunk enough to be taken somewhere or was a druggy ready for some fun and most of them had their eyes glued on her like a hawk wishing for some wardrobe malfunction to happen, which usually does happen with girls who are too drunk to understand what they are doing. After an hours nuisance Miss Dramebaaz was made to sit on the couch where one of the guys of our group hugged her, trying to calm her down and save us of the embarrassment that she gave. Again came a loud cry "Why did he dump me? I am missing him a lot” followed by many cheesy lines (yes, of course, she was talking about her EX!!). The only thing that came to my mind at that time was at least he didn’t KILL her, you can understand how much I wanted to do that at that point of time but all I could do was to show some sympathy like everyone else did.
By the time we all were tired our ‘Drama Queen’ got back to normal and pulled all of us back to the dance floor and started off with her cheap cabaret dance. I can’t describe the amount of lust I had seen in the eyes of the guys present there but she was so lost in her own dance that we all had to pull her out of the pub. Moreover, guess what she said the moment we were out of that place: “Why the hell did you guys drag me out of there? We were enjoying SO much (to which I wondered whom all did she refer to when she said WE – well if you are smart enough you will understand what she actually meant, kehte hai na samajhdar ko ishara hi kafi hota hai!!). To this a guy replied: “From next time you don’t wear this porous skirt and we will let you dance to your heart’s content”. That poor guy had no idea what he was about to get in return of his honesty - a slap followed by a few English abuses and a little information about her skirt. The girl yelled at the top of her voice saying “I bought this skirt from Allen Solly (she had bought a casual skirt from a brand famous for its formals and felt so great about it). Don’t you dare comment on it.” The guy was in no mood to let go of her so easily and said “I saw a similar skirt in a flea market.” And we laughed like mad, his words were like a cherry on the cake, just the right words to end the day and to teach her a lesson in the most decent way…..
That day was full of fun, actually fun at the cost of a stupid girl who thought that she was smart enough to fake to the extent no one could understand. DU colleges are full of such specimens and what I realized that day was that people can do any damn thing to be in the limelight and loosing self-respect or respect in the eyes of others wasn’t a big issue for them, portrayal of a fake image to get popular was like a routine thing for them. The drive and the craze for getting popular is so much prevalent among the DU students that they are ready to forget their real selves, just like our ‘Drama Queen’ and trust me she would not mind giving you a few tips on how to become the best of her category - I really don’t understand why did the Dramsoc of our college reject her? I must say they are at a big loss.
IF U LIKE THIS ARTICLE OR WANT TO SHARE YOUR VIEWS OR HAVE ANY QUERIES REGARDING IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT DO TALK TO ME BY COMMENTING ON THE ARTICLE.
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KNOW YOUR FRIEND FROM DU
Dyuti Bardhan, a second year sociology student from Sri Venkateshwra College, is an extrovert person who loves to interact with people. A trained singer in classical music, she loves to hum bollywood songs. She loves shopping, cooking, eating spicy stuff, writing diary, photography and is a complete fashion freak.
