Some of these songs, the rest of the movie has America looking terrible. But it only has the punch because you contrast it with the earlier “America is freedom and happiness and I love it here” beginning.

New York is a movie I have never seen, because it looks all kinds of depressing. It’s about three happy college friends who fall out and are reunited years later when the police ask Neal Nitin Mukesh to go undercover and find out if John Abraham has joined a violent radical group, after John was wrongfully arrested and tortured (all of this is the opening of the movie, and then it flashes back and forward and other stuff happens). So, it’s a 9/11 movie. BLECH! But it opens with this great joyful song of their college years in New York.

In this song, our hero and heroine were in love in India years earlier but somehow could never get it together, the timing was always off. Now he is in New York shooting a movie based on their love story and he runs into her. They are both single and this time, instead of waiting, they decide to get married that day. It’s freedom and joy and being independent from all the pressures that made their romance impossible in India, it’s pure happiness! “Anbil Avan”

My Name is Khan, another super sad 9/11 movie. But what makes the racism towards desis so terrible in the post 9/11 world is how happy things were just before. America was the place of falling in love and discovering beauty and being happy. Like in this song, our shy salesman hero falls for our confident divorcee businesswoman, a couple you just wouldn’t have in India. “Tere Naina”

Happy song! A friendship that just wouldn’t happen in India. Three fun urban young people, one of whom happens to be female, all living together in the same apartment, sharing their lives, with no romance or thought of romance. Yes, the guys are attracted to her, but they would never act on it, friendship is the best. “Jaane Kyun”.

Oooo, evil America! But also fun and theme park like America. Our three leads go off to distract themselves at Universal World and Las Vegas when their hearts are breaking. That’s the great thing about America, all the fun stuff you can do! “Yeh Dil Deewana”

Chicago looks so good in this song! Dreamy love song about wandering through the streets following your love interest, in which the streets you are wandering through look really amazingly sunny and fresh and beautiful. “Tu Hi Junoon”

And then, back to New York! “Mitwa” in which America is a place you live and have gotten used to, until suddenly you are in love and it feels magical again.