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I was excited to be assigned to visit the Bigg Boss house, because it’s THE house, where one of India’s biggest and most popular reality show was going to play out for the next couple of months.
As I reached the location, I noticed that the newly designed Bigg Boss house as usual very different from the regular homes that you or I live in (even though they try to make it look that way). It looked like any other film or TV set. The inner me was slightly disappointed as I was expecting it to be fancier than it looked. There was a large metallic gate with paint peeling off, leaves scattered around, paint stains on the ground, the production crew running from one place to the other, food being cooked in gigantic utensils and watching over all this were hoardings of Arshad Warsi, Shilpa Shetty, Amitabh Bachchan and Salman Khan displayed season by season on various parts of the sets.
The large wooden gate swung open as it does when each contestant enters the house for the first time. As I stepped into the garden area, the first thing I saw was the iconic huge eye of Bigg Boss staring right at me with the branding just below it.
The memories of watching the Bigg Boss house started flashing by as I stood near the swimming pool. The benches in the middle of the garden area, the gym, the smoking area - though it was my first time in the house, it all looked familiar.
The huge wall which holds the LCD which connects Salman Khan and the contestants was filled with colourful buttons of various sizes. More than anything, the colours took my breath away. Right next to it was a pure black and white wall with several comic-style illustrations on it giving the room a contrast and much needed visual break.
The sofa set, on which everybody sits so that Sallu Bhai can take their case was now divided into two which had colourful cushions with comic illustrations. A third wall in the living room area had bright coloured flowers on it.
We then turned towards the kitchen and dining area, where most fights in the house start. It was decorated with huge horse-shaped mirrors, colourful glass bottles, vintage style kitchen cupboards with sketches of kettles and milk bottles, and two doors which had green and red artificial apples stuck on them. My eyes fell on the famous kitchen counter, where more gossip than food is cooked up.
This time the dining table is round in shape and Omung Kumar explained the reason for it:
Other parts of the house were designed with varied quirky themes. There was a silver shimmery sofa shaped like lips and another sofa in the shape of a fallen Britain classic red telephone booth placed against a wall full of doodles. I quizzed Omung about how he decided on which look to go with.
The bedroom had big double beds and again was so colourful with pink, orange and red splashed on the walls. The beds looked so comfy that I realised why the housemates would hate getting out of bed to do tasks at 7 am.
The bathrooms had grassy green doors, with small pastel-shaded colourful flowers popping out of the walls and wow, that black and white jacuzzi, make me a contestant already!
As the big black leather door to the confession room opened, the voice “Bigg Boss chaahte hai ki aap confession room me aaye,” played in my head. The couch here was designed like a car with a BB 11 number plate on it. The walls were plastered with eyes conveying all kinds of expressions - eerie!
Bigg Boss House: The Jail
As we stepped out, ready to end the Bigg Boss house tour, Omung asked, “Aren’t you guys missing on something?” and that’s when it struck me, we hadn’t seen the jail.
I took a 360-degree turn, to catch the black cell which was almost underground. It looked like a dungeon from the Game of Thrones with low-voltage bulbs being the only source of light. As Omung had mentioned, it was designed after the jail created in Sarbjit. Forget an air conditioner, the cell did not even have a fan, all it contained was three beds, two low voltage bulbs and a lot of darkness.
To all the contestants on Bigg Boss this year - you really don’t want to be stuck in there!
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