So, What Is Your Kitchen Song?
Everyone knows what a kitchen song is, but if you don’t, let me tell you.
A kitchen song is one on which you can dance on while cooking.
Well, any fast song can become a kitchen song. Any song on which one can dance can become a kitchen song. But there are specific songs that so perfectly suit your kitchen that whenever you listen to them, you can imagine yourself moving and shaking your booty to, encircling your kitchen top.
Before moving to this new house five years ago, my mother and I discussed a lot about how it should be designed. We did not end up checking everything on the list, but the center top in the kitchen was checked out. My father is a little reserved and had a hard time accepting the kitchen top in the middle. I wanted it in between, and my mother agreed to it. It is not a new concept, but people only go for it sometimes.
And I also got my wish fulfilled for the French window. Yes, I have a window in my room that opens to my balcony. Most of the time, I do not come in through the door but by the window.
So, coming back to the point, the kitchen of our home has a center top, and we do the Garba encircling it all the time. Whenever I decide to take a break from work and go outside my room in the kitchen, I do not enter without singing a song.
If you remember the character of SWEETY MATHUR from HUM PAANCH, played by RAKHEE TANDON (RAVEENA TANDON’s sister-in-law), who used to open the main door by singing a song and dancing, whenever any guest would arrive or when her father would come back from office, in the evening. It had become one of the signature things that made the show famous. I do precisely the same, and if you have seen that show, you’ll be able to picture what I am talking about.
Another signature thing about the show was KAJAL MATHUR’s character, played by BHAIRAVI RAICHUR. She was a tomboy who went by the name of KAJAL BHAI.
My mother also joins me in dancing around the kitchen. Sometimes I end up playing English songs, and sometimes I even play Korean songs (because I am obsessed with K-drama OST and BTS). But she would try to match steps with me on every song. At times, when my dad was preparing tea for us during weekends, in the evening around 6, mum and I both would do garba, and he would record videos for us along with keeping an eye on boiling tea.
However, one of my fondest memories of dancing around the kitchen is when two of my friends joined my mum and me, and we danced to the MALHAARI SONG of the movie BAJIRAO MASTANI.
So, what happened was we three friends have known each other for the past ten years. One of them is married right now, another is soon to be married, and I am unmarried. So, two of us thought to give the third one a bachelorette party. It was just three of us, and some booze on the balcony of my house, some snacks, and music playing in the background, and we danced and gossiped and had fun.
My parents were out for the night. And the following day, when my parents arrived. Dad had to go to the office, so mum and my other two were at home. I woke up hearing the sound of mum humming to the song in the kitchen, but those two were dead asleep. When I came out of my room, mum was cooking, and I started helping her. Eventually, those two woke up and entered the kitchen to help too.
We were hungover, and mum wanted to cheer us up in the morning. So, she started humming another song which was a little faster and more fun. I started humming with her, and before we knew it, all four of us sang it loudly at the top of our lungs. Then I thought of something and started playing another one of the fast songs on my phone. One of my friends brought the Bluetooth speaker and connected my phone. The third one set the playlist, and within a heartbeat, all four of us were dancing around the kitchen top, cooking and cleaning the house sometimes, and laughing and recording ourselves.
I have always known life to be a long series of tiny moments that makes it worth living. Hence, I have always been persistent in making them purposely by doing things that make me laugh and others, too. I specifically invite my friends to have coffee, read a book, or attend a food fest in my town.
I often buy food packets and distribute them amongst the poor with my friends. I call my brother or cousins to attend a poetry night or theatre with me. Whenever I receive my salary, I insist on taking my parents out for dinner or a movie. From time to time, I volunteer to do social service. And if nothing comes to mind, I call my girlfriends; and we end up dancing to kitchen songs.
Here are a few of my favorite kitchen songs (to dance with your girlfriends or family, especially kids or boyfriend/husband):
1. Chikni Chameli — Movie: Agneepath
2. Melting by Cheeze — Series: Forecasting Love and Weather
3. What makes you beautiful by One Direction
4. Kesariya Dance Mix — Movie: Brahmastra
5. Hoedown Throwdown by Miley Cyrus
6. Joomma Chumma De De — Movie: Hum
7. Balam Pichakaree — Movie: Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani
8. Paper rings by Taylor Swift (Her Love Story Song works too)
9. Malhaari — Movie: Bajirao Mastani
10. Sooraj Dooba Hai — Movie: Roy
11. Girls like you by Maroon 5
12. Savage Love by Jason Derulo and BTS
Bonus: Dynamite, Permission to dance, and Butter by BTS
Please don’t ask me why I added a bonus to the list (KPOP being my latest obsession).
If there is anything that I would like to pass it on to my kids as a legacy, it would be making memories by dancing in the kitchen barefooted, or having a cup of Tea/Coffee in the rain and talk endlessly for hours, or going on a car ride randomly in the middle of the night singling retro Bollywood songs.
How about you? What is your Kitchen Song/Songs?
