Jaipur Comedy Night was another innovative initiative by Turquoise Frames on 25^th June 2016. Drishti and I were pumped up to have a laugh or two while sitting comfortably and writing some funny jokes in our diaries which we could show off to our family and friends so that we would look like budding stand-up comedians ourselves.

Speaking of which, the sight of no female comedians embedded a dismal feeling within us. To this, Vriddhi Swalani, the event management laureate had to say:

“I was very disappointed at the knowledge of that fact. I feel like people here don’t want to get out of their comfort zone. They still have a serious cage of stage fright. In contrast, Poetry Slam had more female participants than the male ones. That’s somewhat relieving.”

Drishti also asked Vriddhi if she was ready to retaliate to any sexist jokes if there would be any. To this, she said that she had already asked the participants not to be offensive to any gender or prominent personality.

Phew!

Drishti was also curious to know which comedians Vriddhi immensely liked. And, her list mirrors mine!! She really admires Russell Peters, Kanan Gill, and Biswa Kalyan Rath.

The event consisted of more people than the room of The Urban Hub could host, but Vriddhi and her team were very much at ease and made every possible attempt to control the unkempt audience scattered all over the place.

The thing about some of us is that we are very much invested in trying out how the Chill Potato of every café that exists in Jaipur tastes and how they look in a selfie or if their Snapchat Story is on point or not. We are so invested that we almost ignore the presence of any participant in any event.

The audience proved to be very perfunctory at times and had to be cajoled to applaud at the performances of the stand-up comedians.

Nevertheless, DJ Ravindra ( a radio jockey on 93.5 Red FM) performed and stirred excitement in the crowd. He joked about how his father has still not been able to accept his career choice. He also recounted the number of times people have refused to believe that it was actually him in real life.

Next, Mehul Agarwal of Neerja Modi School talked about girls and their one worded message responses like “Hmmm’ or “K.’

Well, boys, you do it, too! And when you do, it’s equally frustrating. Some sexism detected? Not much, yeah.

Mehul also made everyone laugh by saying-“I am a very serious person.” In the most serious of voices. We all giggled.

Or at least I did. We’ll never know…

Mehul also seemed to recognize and acknowledge the fact that there are still very few female comedians here, and there is a serious need for some.

Another performer, Arpit Jain threw light on the whole Salman Khan controversy and why his fans are such hardcore fanatics of his that they won’t say anything against him.

Manan Goenka decided to devise a new scale of happiness that revolved around Punjabis. Lowest level of happiness? You hit rock button.

Another comedian distinctly said that he was from Bikaner, a place between Venus and Mercury.

Hmm. We all clutched our stomachs at that opening line.

Yes. Really. We did.

Sarvagya imitated Gujaratis and their odd but adorable way of speaking. It was hilarious to listen to.

We had some musical performances lined up for the night that was like a fresh breath of air from all the nervous yet talented comedians. The girls that performed made me swell up with pride and admiration like a peanut. Yes, peanut.

By the end of this article, I will be a stand-up comedian myself.

From some time, I have started to wholeheartedly appreciate women with cameras. For some reason, it looks empowering and independent. And, I am happy to report that there were both professional and amateur women photographers at the event.

That was wonderful to see.

We were delighted and partly frustrated at the growing crowd, but all was well as no one tried to spoil the fun by being very disturbing or disrespectful.

I’d like to count this event as one of the successful ones by Turquoise Frames. So what if it was crowded? The initiative and the motive of providing a reliable platform to artists still stands strong amid the flurry of people.

Nonetheless, we hope to see a better sense of humor in Jaipurities soon.

I say this because I am so unfunny.