Have we surrendered to terror?

In the cacophony of allegations and counterallegation muddied by insinuations, it's no wonder that neither public places are well-secured nor a meticulous investigation is done in the event of a tragedy...More...

Kannada: getting it right

Mispronounced words in Kannada make awful listening. It’s been rampant and no body seems to be aware of their own mistakes - not that everybody is perfect - while they speak, leave alone grammar...More...

Bangalore media: Silly season is here

My sense is that ministers fed the secretariat reporters self-serving statements and lofty welfare announcements. What is spoon-fed is usually spin and hype, rarely, hard news. And officials, generally more reliable than their political bosses, can’t be expected to part with anything more than what they would want media to know...More...

Oh, Kabuliwalah!!!

I hope Khaled Hosseini and you all will read the Kabuliwallah story and allow that story to fill your heart & eyes. It was Tagore’s gift to an Afghan in 1892...I was fortunate that three Afghan movies I had seen earlier, prepared me for the various scenes in the Kite Runner and Kabul...More...

Mom, can I be a nail polish designer?

My wife is not amused by this cynicism. You are a boor and a brute, she tells me, for casting aspersions on Manish Malhotra's enormous contribution to the vast and challenging science of nail polish design...More...

Britain strikes back at the Empire

Recently there was an interesting news item. The British retail chain Marks & Spencer is planning to sell curry in India through franchise shops. Soon Indians can taste 'British' curry without visiting the Curry Houses of that country...More...

Staying (dis)connected

How many of us really keep in touch with our old friends? All of us have met so many people since childhood ...We lose track of some of them just due to the sheer number of new faces that we meet everyday. Obviously, you give it your best shot to stay in touch with all, but the inevitable slowly seeps in...More...

Ara in heritage homes

Ara means an enclosed storage area, often used for threshed grain – paddy in the Kerala context. Landlords who owned and cultivated large areas would have such storehouses near the fields and also an in-house granary to stock un-husked rice for home consumption...More...

Dog haters and their tactics

Read a disturbing write up in a newspaper about dog haters and their tactics to kill dogs that they have been promoting on the social network orkut...i wonder what makes them think on those lines!...More...

Living with long term illness

This Blog is, therefore, a harrowing recounting of long term illness. It is not for the faint hearted who hate hearing bad news, and avoid sick people, even if they are close friends or relatives...More...

ERR's Bangalore, in mid-50s

Most of State Govt. employees would walk it out to Taluk office and Atahara Katcheri with Mysore Peta on their heads and wearing their marriage coat over Kachhe Panche! Few people rode cycles and fewer who wore Kachhes, because of the fear of unfolding risk!...More...

Dubai Air Show - 2007

Like most Air Shows, there were people from the defense forces from around the region, I found too many of them from the Pakistani Air Force. Here I thought that they had an emergency going on in that country...More...

November noise naraka yaatane!

I wonder why celebrations like these and even festivals come to the streets and create a grand public nuisance. They have to be held in auditoria or inside homes with least disturbance to others. If disturbing is their right and a form of bullying, what can the common man do?...More...

Drop expectations

Case after case that i meet at my counselling centre come to me with a baggage of disappointments, unable to bear them, unable to drop them and move on in life. they get stuck, brood and brood and get into depression...More...

Manivannan’s here to stay; sorry, Shimoga

As a Mysorean my first thought on learning of the fall of the Yeddyurappa government was, “Manivannan won’t have to move, after all”. His transfer order to Shimoga would have been given effect had Mr Y survived Monday’s assembly session. Mysore municipal/MUDA commissioner Mr Manivannan would have moved to Shimoga, Mr Y’s native place...More...

Domestic waste disposal

This list of guidelines for three-way source segregation of waste was circulated by our residents’ association. I am posting it here because it could be useful to others as well...More...

Bangalore politics stinks

Sick -- that's in one word the state of politics in Karnataka today. Since September, the state's politics has been going from bad to worse. To what depths it can further descend remains to be seen...More...

Management lessons from dogs

I'm no management expert but I'm quite sure biting one's colleagues, barking at visitors and pooping in public have no place in the book on sound business practices...There is one dog behavior, though, that is thought to be the key behind rapid growth in the organization...cringing, wagging one's tail in the presence of superiors...More...

Lakshmi-Varsha reconnect

“You know,” she chuckled, “ It’s weird that the only people I hate are the people I like,”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s funny, it’s quite difficult to explain. It turns out that the people I usually quarrel with are often my best pals, get it?...More...

Horn Musicians

Oftentimes, they honk the horn without even analyzing the availability of space for the other fellow to leave for him. They press the button simply because they have the facility!...More...

Toughest job on earth

I am reminded of a child’s words to its parents: “Papa and Mama, Love me most when I deserve it the least for it is then that I need it most”...More...

Abraham's blog day thoughts

The inspiration for my entry into the blogosphere was my good friend from Bangalore college days, Jacob Matthan (Sushil). He now lives in Finland and successfully handles about half a dozen blogs, the flagship being Jacob's Blog...More...

Madras music season

We have tried to get Mylaporeans and Adyarites to offer bed and breakfast facilities for the 'December season'...We have also tried to coax people to host 'coffee and chat' nooks and meetings so that visiting artistes, touring groups and south India-bound tourists have a space to get a closer 'feel' of music and dance...Perhaps, my friend V. Sriram will after all decide to host at least two heritage walks devoted to music /dance in December...More...

Back to normal

Gautham asked me if I knew how to catch a squirrel. I replied in the negative. "Climb up a tree and pretend to be a nut". Vyaas considered this carefully and added "in your case, you don't need to pretend" and ran away before I could clout him one. Kids!...More...

Emu farming in India

Kerala too has got into the act. In May this year my brother Jacob at Olavipe bought three pairs each of emu chicks and fairly grown up ones, twelve altogether, on a trial basis....More...

A-bomb and Vedic connection

And he insisted he slept well, believing that using the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki saved more lives than they erased because they eliminated the need for a drawn-out invasion of Japan...More...

Karnataka CM on thanksgiving rounds

He has been doing the rounds of temples and mutts, has done homa at his official chamber at Vidhana Soudha. He has paid a visit to his village astrologer near Tumkur...More...

Attack!

“What’s the time,” he asked. I answered.
“What’s your name,” he asked. “None of your business” I said.
He came closer and I was getting jittery. His eyes looked red. He meant business.
“I only want 500 Rs., ” he said...More...

Mysore be damned; shift Mr M to Shimoga

Surely, there must be many Manivannans in the our civil administration, if the C M were to apply his mind to finding a suitable officer. But then our chief minister seems in a hurry to make Shimoga ’shine’. Never mind, if Mysore be damned, in the process...More...

Washing away your echchal

...when I eat outside, I just close my mind to the way it is cooked. It is too scary to think about it...I have also realized that it is very difficult to explain the concept of echchal to a person who has never understood the importance of it...More...