VCR, DVD and Home remedies

I remember when I was in school and pre-degree, there were two things I yearned for. One was a phone at home and the other was a VCR. VCR was a luxury at that time. We had TV with Doordarshan, but somehow, my Appa did not feel the need for a VCR. And when something is not there, human mind really longs for it.

There was this custom at that time, that people rented video players and the cassettes from the shop. During my summer vacations to Pammal, Chennai, I have had the privilege to view a lot of Kamal's movies in video. They used to call a VCR a 'deck' for some reason. Renting a VCR was termed 'deck edukkarathu' (in Tamil) .Kamal fan cousin rented Kamal movies and Rajni fan cousin rented Rajni movies! Coming back home, I have seen people around our house, renting them and inviting me also to watch them. I remember I tried to convince dad to rent one and he seemingly agreed to it, and I was disappointed later to find he was not really convinced. He did not want to deal with the renting issues but wanted to buy one. And soon, we owned one.

And the problems that come with it! There were bad old tapes with fungus in them. The picture was not clear and you had to clean the VCR head. Remember the spray with a long red tube that sprayed the cleaning liquid..and the cleaning tape. What a relief to see Mohanlal's face clear after the cleaning session!

And then there was this trick called 'tuning' when the picture used to jump continuously! It was so annoying and irritating. A movie just began and then the picture jumps on and on. If you have experienced this, you will know what it exactly means. We would hope that it will get better after 5 minutes of playing. Sometimes I did, mostly it did not. Tuning helped stop the heroes from jumping and limping on the screen.

Then came the issue of camera prints. We will be all thrilled to see a new movie cassette in the store and would be easily tempted to rent it. And only when you put it, you knew that it is a camera print. You could see shadows of people standing before the screen and cloudy picture and loud volume. And the comment from mom follows - why did you take this camera print - as though you knew it is going to be this bad.

Then came the DVD and VCD era. Wow..clear picture and uninterrupted viewing of the movies! I never want to go back to the video tapes and their problems. I slip on the DVD from Indian Store in US. Hey, but wait! Why is this movie stuttering and stammering? It is a DVD and it played well so far..what happened? Guess, there are some scratches or is it dirt on it? I take it out, blow on it and wipe it well with a tissue..and that could get me to the climax of the movie.

I guess whatever advancements technology makes, there will be new kinds of problems and new home remedies! Life is never perfect.