Dehradun, Sept. 20 -- Have you had a random moment in life when it felt like you were in a sitcom? A feeling of being trapped in a somewhat surreal situation, where you're watching yourself and marveling at the absurdity of it all? Or that your life is at times so funny you deserve your own camera crew?

About ten years ago, when I was living in Bangalore, I one day found myself in the unfamiliar role of being a translator between my building's Nepali watchman-cum-supervisor and a foreign tenant with broken English and who didn't speak Hindi.

One afternoon, while I was finishing up season two of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia after getting home from a 4 a.m. - 12 p.m. shift, the doorbell rang. It was Ramesh, who spoke decent Hindi but...