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Bangalore, Day 9
Feb. 8th, 2012 10:02 amI've finally figured out how to operate the television in my room. The problem ultimately was that the remote for the descrambler had dead batteries. Easily fixed.
In keeping with the hotel's international clientele, the channels represent a broad range. There are a stack of channels in Indian language(s), but also two from France, one from Russia, one from Germany, a few from south-east Asia and Al Jazeera from the middle east.
There are a handful of cricket channels and a stack of sports channels, and by sports I mean still more cricket channels.
I found some familiar North American channels, or rather, their Indian equivalents: CNN India, MSNBC India, etc.. I think only the BBC new channel looked the same on both both US and Indian televisions.
They have VH1. Sorry about that, India.
The Indian news channels were intriguing: many times the speakers were talking a local language with appropriate upper-screen titles while the ticker across the bottom was english. In fact, many of the channels have a mix of languages, switching between english and other languages in the same program or commercial, sometimes in mid-sentence. One National Geographic channel has two overlapping audio tracks in different simultaneous languages, the net effect being that one can't make out the narrative at all.
The commercials seem to come in two major varieties: the basic story theme in a style & structure western eyes would quickly recognize, and the Bollywood musical style with lots of singing & stylized dancing, praising the product or service in question, or just creating an atmosphere of energy & excitement.
I've been watching one of the movie channels, an Indian channel showing primarily American movies. Every now and then, text scrolls across the dead center of the screen, inviting anyone who is offending by any aspect of the movie to complain to a gov't review board.
The single most striking commonality between Indian and American television is obvious, however: 500 channels and nothing on. I'm going to go read a book.
In keeping with the hotel's international clientele, the channels represent a broad range. There are a stack of channels in Indian language(s), but also two from France, one from Russia, one from Germany, a few from south-east Asia and Al Jazeera from the middle east.
There are a handful of cricket channels and a stack of sports channels, and by sports I mean still more cricket channels.
I found some familiar North American channels, or rather, their Indian equivalents: CNN India, MSNBC India, etc.. I think only the BBC new channel looked the same on both both US and Indian televisions.
They have VH1. Sorry about that, India.
The Indian news channels were intriguing: many times the speakers were talking a local language with appropriate upper-screen titles while the ticker across the bottom was english. In fact, many of the channels have a mix of languages, switching between english and other languages in the same program or commercial, sometimes in mid-sentence. One National Geographic channel has two overlapping audio tracks in different simultaneous languages, the net effect being that one can't make out the narrative at all.
The commercials seem to come in two major varieties: the basic story theme in a style & structure western eyes would quickly recognize, and the Bollywood musical style with lots of singing & stylized dancing, praising the product or service in question, or just creating an atmosphere of energy & excitement.
I've been watching one of the movie channels, an Indian channel showing primarily American movies. Every now and then, text scrolls across the dead center of the screen, inviting anyone who is offending by any aspect of the movie to complain to a gov't review board.
The single most striking commonality between Indian and American television is obvious, however: 500 channels and nothing on. I'm going to go read a book.
