Originally posted by: GirlOfFire
Knock! Knock!! Who's There?
Dadi
Dadi Who?
Da di-mwit from SP & PH
First of all, we are now firmly in the realm of Saas-Bahu di-raamaa!! I went through confusion, irony, and yuck factors all in a row. So i'll try to list them out as I saw them.
Secondly, I am confused. I usually have very strong opinions about things. But todays knee-jerk reaction to the pre-cap was YES!! And then I had to watch it again and again just to get a feel for where we are at.
So let's start at the very beginning, shall we? Manorama Mami is in a tizzy. She is fluttering around with NK and Payal as her audience and tells them about Dadi being missing and Arnav and Naniji still out searching for her.
Irony # 1:Payal and Manorama are actually having a conversation. Mami's nervousness idue to Dadiji's 'danger' is causing her to even speak to Payal in a more 'normal' manner.
Meanwhile, Anjali is at the temple.
Manorama doesn't want Dadi to come here. Cue Dadi walking up the (astro-turfed) path and the stairs with a mat and a suitcase.
Where is Khushi? She is in the garden tending to his/her roses. I remember a time when Arnav said he never had roses in his garden. So looks like wifey's favorite flowers have made it into his garden now.
Cute Factor # 1: High
Confusion #1: Khushi says - By the time these buds will bloom DI's baby would have been born. What the?! Anjali is that far gone into her pregnancy that she's due any day now? Why don't we know about it?
Khushi heads towards the door with a tub of water. In true RM style, Dadi enters without knocking (What! they keep even the front door unlocked these days?) In true Khushi fashion, she throws up the tub of water and Dadi is splashed. Dadi's immediate reaction is anger! (Surprise!!) How dare a servant toss water onto her. (Ummm... Dadi, perhaps if you'd rung the doorbell... you know, a little thing called etiquette? Now I know where Anjali gets it from).
In her defense though, Khushi does not look like a Bahu - no jewelry, no bangles, hair mussed and tied up. Unlike Payal and Mamiji in their over decked, over made up glory! So Dadi makes the same kind of superficial judgement that ASR did the first time, that Khushi is a servant.
Irony #2: Khushi thought Mamiji was the servant the first time she entered RM and therefore Mamiji continues to ill-treat her and call her phatti sari to this day. Dadi thought Khushi was the servant and immediately wants to put her in her place.
Yuck Factor # 1: The 'aukaat' word makes a return. Yet it is Mami who shows her true aukaat. She is nothing in front of the Malik fish. At least the Raizadas give her some respect!
NK stole the scene and my heart here in the way he introduces himself to Dadi. Hi I'm Nand Kishore. and he sticks out his hand. There is a total lack of self-consciousness in his whole outlook, and the completely confidence he has in his dimples!
Cute Factor #2 : Through the roof!
As soon as Dadi goes, he immediately tells mami off - its wrong. Khushiji is a bahu in this house, not the servant. Once again stepping up as Khushi's defender. This is a role he will continue playing in the coming weeks, I hope.
Cute Factor #3: High
Yuck Factor # 2: Mamiji's refusal to tell Dadiji about Khushi's true role in the household. why should I be the one to inform her that Arnav had a secret marriage with phatti sari? (Not very brave, are you, Mami when there's a bigger fish in the pond?)
Confusion # 2: Nani and Dadi are BFFs? What the?! Enough said. However, I wonder. Is that why their children got married in the first place? (We'll watch and see).
Payal and Khushi have a bonding moment in the kitchen while Payal prepares milk for Dadiji. Payal regrets Mamiji not clearing up the MU right away with Dadi. 'Tumne suna na Mamiji ne kya kaha? Koi farq nahin padta!' Why? Because Khushi has never been given her rightful place as the bahu of this house? The lingering farq padta hai makes another entry here.
Khushi's monologue. Beautiful. Naive, innocent. I'll tell her that I am the bahu of this house. Why have I never heard of her before? ...So many things I don't know about Arnavji. Sometimes it feels like I dont even know this man whom I love so much!
Cute Factor # 4: Very High!
Dadi makes herself at home in Nani's(?) room. Then she goes for her bath before its time for pooja. (See? It runs in the family- this obsession with puja!) Khushi meanwhile arrives with the milk for Dadi, knocks, and gets no response. She is about to step in, when Dadi raises an imperious hand, and gestures her to go away. She steps back. Dadi closes the door, and draws the curtains.
Yuck Factor #3: Through the roof! We've seen it all before with ASR, Dadiji.
Dadi comes down and bumps into Mami with the milk. Tells her off about sending servants to provide food for her. She doesn't take ANYTHING from the hands of servants.
What follows is simply degrading to Khushi. What I don't understand is why Khushi who is so capable of standing up for herself is now tongue-tied. And even her feeble attempts to explain who she is, is cut off. Dadi makes Mami take the thaal and purify it and herself. Then she gestures for Khushi to leave the temple. How much it must have hurt her, to leave her Devi Mayya when she is her purest devotee. I nearly cried for her.
Yuck Factor #4: OMG
Even Payal abandons her here, but NK waits on Khushi and only leaves when she does. I am thinking - another showdown, and NK will once again be by her side. He is her truest supporter at this point.
Anjali returns from the temple, and when Khushi opens the door she is concerned for her, because of her wan look. This was a really nice touch and follow up from earlier that day. She is truly trying to get back to their previous relationship. Her caring for Khushi shines through.
But it is short-lived. She hears Dadi's voice and the little girl Anjali comes out, hurries over to her and hugs her.
Confusion # 3: Why does Dadi not hug her back? What stops her? Its kind of like ASR's almost hug in the hospital, except less of it!
Then Dadi says: I didn't know you were going to become a mother?
Confusion #4: First of all, you were sequestered in an ashram. Were you supposed to be informed of these things? If so, who has been in touch with you that didn't tell you about the baby's impending arrival?
Confusion #5: How on earth did you deduce that she was going to be a mother? By that invisible baby bump that she has?
In most TV series, when actors or actresses get pregnant in real life, they either tie it into the story (Courtney Cox in Friends, Emily Deschanel in Bones) or the camera never pans below the waist or there's stuff placed in front of the tummy to hide the bump and/or they cut down screen time for the actress (Mariska Hargitay in Law and Order:SVU). So why oh why can't the DP use these same techniques to NOT show Anji's baby bump? Why do we need full body shots of her unless its a long-distance shot or a shot of her back? I think it would be more palatable to ALL viewers. All in agreement - press Like!
Dadi finally hugs her back and enquires about Damadji...Oops!! Everyone looks tensed...Anjali walks away. The look that Dadi gives all of them... especially Khushi... I am thinking hmmm.. does she think what I am thinking, that the pretty 'servant' girl is the reason for Damadji's absence?
Dadi follows Anjali to her room, and we see a moment of Grandma/Grand daughter bonding. Anjali breaks down and sobs in Dadi's lap. The scene closes with the ominous and fateful words: 'Ab aapki dadi wapis aa gayi hai. Sab kuch theek ho jayega'.
Hall Shot : Nani and Arnav on one side. Dadi and Anjali on the other. In between are Mami. Payal, NK, Khushi.. .Are the battle lines drawn?
The Last Confusion: Why does Dadi come into the Raizada home and behave like it is hers? What gives her the right to be commanding everyone around in the place - after fourteen years of absence?
Ruby - one time you said this about the Raizada men: that they are a little weak in the spinal area. Its the Malik strain that is capable of cruelty. The Malik men are headstrong, and have mean characteristics. ASR was like that. Dadi seems to be like that. They even have shared gestures - the imperial raised hand. The disdain for people of a lesser aukat (including Mami). I have to totally bow down to you on this one. You hit the nail on the head!
I am not going into the precap here, because I loved it - but I want to see the whole thing before I say anything about it.
Thought for the day: SP proclaims itself as a Nayi Soch channel. What happened today was anything BUT Nayi Soch. Its a Ghissi-piti soch that is being fed to the viewers now.
One last thing: What I will say next may offend some of you, and if so I apologize in advance. I don't like debates on religion. Having said that, I wanted to point out some factors in today's episode that has irked me many times in real and reel life. Remember this is one episode of Dadi and she may yet turn out to be better than we thought. BUT...When a person is overly religious, it is one of two things - that that person has a true belief in the higher being that governs our lives. OR that person compensates for the lack of true faith in their lives by doing all the rituals in a mechanical manner. There are three very religious people in this series. Khushi, Anjali and now Dadi.
Khushi's is the true faith of a devotee. A person who will turn to God in good times and thank Him/Her, and in bad times for strength to deal with their trials. This is a person in whom charity is second nature. Who lives by the principles but doesn't loose herself in rituals. She believes that the rituals support her faith. In reality, she lives her faith. This is the beauty of her character.
Anjali used her religion as a crutch. She compensated for doubts about her husband by participating in rituals that gave her comfort from her doubts. She needed to have those rituals in order to feel that everything would be alright in her world. In other words, her rituals are almost bribes. That does not mean that she does not believe in a higher Being, it just means that her faith is weak and can break at any time. Anjali cannot live her faith, her doubts were very large, and when they crumbled, she broke too.
Dadi as we have already seen, is ultra-conservative, rigid and depends on these rituals to compensate for the lack of true faith. She believes that rituals (shuddhi, pooja, aarti) are the mainstays of religion - not charity, faith and love. Dadi is too far gone down that path - she is late in life, and that's why she will not change - at least in the near future. Dadi embodies a true non-believer and non-devotee - she cannot respect another human being enough to let them touch or feed her! In my dictionary, a true hypocrite (okay I feel very strongly about this, having been on the receiving end of this kind of behavior many a time). If you cannot be charitable towards a fellow human being, you have no right to the kingdom of God! Period.
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HE is the BUT here..so here comes ASR to the rescue...The precap has set a stage now..set a stage where by ASR starts to set this inequality to rights..so ASR does the right by correcting the wrong..by standing with his wife..not only for his wife but for the other DILs in the house who have been treated so...what do we infer from that ...the juggernaut of KKG to KASR has stopped at another station..to correct another wrong..this will continue until ASR corrects the mistakes one by one..giving his khushi the status and dignity attached to being his wife,to being the elder DIL of the raizada house..
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