Turning 40

Today I benched pressed 300 LBS, I am very proud of myself. However, I often wonder why I continue exercising at this pace. My kids are young could be a reason...More

Fleet Street. in the 60s

Major London dailies may have moved to the Docklands, Canary Wharf or wherever, but they remain Fleet Street newspapers. To those in the media Fleet Street is a synonym for British journalism.. .More...

Oru Whisky Oru Masala Dosai

And the buffet did look good enough to hmmm eat !! But what caught my eye was a display card that said "Dosa Dhamaka" exhorting one to eat as much as one could and went on to describe an array of mouthwatering fillings for more than eight different kinds of dosas ........More dosas here


-

Tree slaughter

But who needs words when the trunks can speak. Road-widening is cited as an explanation. What is often not so obvious is a minor fortune some people could stand to make by lobbying for widening roads rich with old avenue trees. . . .More. . .

Yum T V Toadies

We first have the channel advertising auditions for the show and then we are put through a prolonged serial display of Dyphoric Mania with a Dyphoric Maniac and another wimp selecting participants for the show in front of a camera.The selection process does not allow anyone with balls to stand up to the Dyphoric Maniac and only people who the Dyphoric Maniac can intimidate are selected. But not before he humiliates kids half his age in front of the camera because they are so desperate for a break on television...more

KB After 40 years

In the 60s and 70s, we used to look forward to every K. Balachandar (KB) movie – and were never let down. All that we expected from him would be there - a good story, excellent characterisation, suspense and liberal doses of humour. With Nagesh in the cast, there was no dearth of that. More ...

Of my co-editor Kini

Our greatest memory is the friendship that Asoke extended to us unconditionally. I remember my first visit to his generously proportioned apartment in Tottenham Court Road which impressed us no end, as we ourselves as unmarried bachelors lived in oppressively small bed sitters often in bed bunks two to a room. .. .More. . .

BBC thinking out of the box

Elections would be over by mid-May, but the BBC election special would be remembered long after, by folks at Rewari and thousands of others who happen by the train through its journey...More...

Earth Day: What Can I Do?

Can I tell them, “Listen friends all these firewood that you are going to burn is going to produce lots of CO2. At this rate you are going to increase the global warming at a faster rate and in fifty years there will be lots of floods and we will all drown.”?

Going shoeless in Toronto

When he spread the word on his ‘Barefoot challenge’, using Facebook and other networking tools, friends as far afield as Thailand, Australia, Thailand and Afghanistan pledged to shed their shoes in solidarity with Rajan’s ’shoeless week’ (Apl.19-25) to highlight the plight of children who have to go without shoes every day.. .More...

Degrees of separation

I am so engrossed in my laptop that I do not see nor hear a young girl sitting next to me. She is a really good looking Tambram girl. She looks very conservative though from her clothing. She carries a toddler in her arms. She seats the toddler on the chair and goes to get the trolley with her luggage. Before she goes she asks me politely if I will keep an eye on her son. I nod smiling at her. She smiles back reassured. I see her pushing a trolley with numerous bags which she parks near me. Then she glances at the airport entrance and gazes with some desperation at an old couple standing out side...more.

A Meeting of Worlds

She spoke of the many worlds – worlds that would normally have nothing to do with one another - that came together because of the unifying force of music. These were not fleeting interactions, but powerful, intimate ones, where often the accepted social hierarchies were turned upside down. Rich and poor. Hindu and Muslim. Conservative, respectable middle-class Brahmin and devadasi. Yet, it was the rich who bowed their heads and touched the feet of the poor, humbly seeking blessings and knowledge; Hindu and Muslim ascended together to an enchanted sphere where music was god; and value judgments about lifestyle were left at the door, as the Brahmin sought the secrets of musical wisdom and enlightenment from the courtesan. More....

Taragarh Fort, Bundi

"Taragarh Fort must have been built by angels not by human beings," commented Rudyard Kipling. It looks beautiful. A steep climb up the hill, then through enormous gates decorated with elephants which are now in ruins, we were inside the Taragarh Fort of Bundi. In its heydays this fort was well known for the tunnels criss-crossing the entire hill side facilitating the King and his men to flee in case of imminent defeat in wars.

Haircare down the ages

Nobody ever heard of a Sita, Draupadi, Damayanthi and Menaka or for that matter saints like Vashista or Vishwamitra ever complain of lice, tics or worms, then. At least the Epics do not record their complaints. ...Till recently most of the family members were given oil bath on Sundays, with different strokes for different people.. . .More. . .

Summer Beauty

Can you guess what flower this is?
I used to call it the powder puff flower...More....

Irshad Mia, Aadab

This post, addressed to a long lost friend Irshad Panjatan, is done in the hope that if he were to Google this piece, he would know how to find me. Irshad and I haven’t been in touch for nearly five decades now...More...

Please Vote for Me

We should have had the General Elections in July.
Then we could have had the opportunity to expose senior school students to the ins and outs of this democratic process.
Days in June would have been perfect.
Should school students get involved?...More

Some Things Do Change

One of the joys of middle age is letting go. Of so much baggage, fixed notions, of an image one oneself. and being open to new experiences, ideas and new ways of doing things. Not that one is completely transformed but it seems delightful when little events show up different ways of thought...More

Wry Take on the Election exercise

For 5 Thursdays we will be watching candidates and voters showing off their index finger. To make out a voter from a candidate - just note whether the finger is pointed upwards (the voter invokes the divine superpower) or sideways (a pot/kettle calling his fellow kettle/pot black)...More

The Elephant Swims to Crow Island

At about 6.30 in the morning on April 9, the shrimp workers saw a strange movement in the lake on the western side of the island. As the bewildered people watched, a tusker emerged from the water...More

My Miss India rant

If you ever find me wandering about on the streets gesticulating absently and talking to myself, you can tell yourself Naren has lost his mind at last. Unless of course I have got a blue-tooth headset, but that's most unlikely because I have no clue how to bind one with my phone...More

Journalist's Shoe Mightier than Pen?

Journalists report news. Today, a journalist became the news. The Dainik Jagran reporter, Jarnail Singh’s, act of lobbing his shoe at home minister P Chidambaram at a media conference, brought the profession and journalists to shame. I, as a journalist, felt bad...More

Be ragged or else be damned?

I have heard students and teachers justify “ragging”. They say it helps a person to face the real world. Is it so? Will the scars of ragging ever fade? And sometimes the scars can be physical too as in this recent case in a reputed college in Coimbatore...More

Tytler Case: A Small Specimen Of Social Justice

With due respect to Mr. Tytler, it would have really been a matter of disgrace for the Indian democracy if he got the opportunity to contest, and then could manage to become a Minister later. I am saying this not only because he was accused of a particular crime. Rather, I am trying to highlight the nature of the crime that he was accused of...More

A Typical Conversation--Part 1

It does not require any serious thinking to note that we (we men) tend to have diametrically opposite behavior as compared to the fairer sex. It is not a post to highlight the superiority of one set of beings over the other or vice versa...More

What Happened to Chechi?

In the eighteenth year of our wedding, Suja who was a 1st year medical student at the time of our marriage (discontinued since) started to complain about an irritation in her right ear. Naturally I took her to an ENT specialist...More

Reminiscences of Vishu

The summer has started, but the greenery is seen all around. It is also the season for ripened mangoes. Vishu, the second most important festival of Kerala Hindus is celebrated during the middle of April, most often on the fourteenth. Harvests are over and Easter is round the corner...More

Yamuna Veruthe

I watched Ore Kadal, again when it came in Kairali TV. I liked that movie a lot. It is the kind of movie I like to watch without any interruptions.Watching every emotion that goes through Meera Jasmine, Narein etc.I don’t like Meera’s other movies like Kasthooriman, Rasathanthram or even Achuvinte Amma.Those looked like to me as over excited acting...More

The Power of Just One Goal

I am glad I went back. I am having a lot of fun. The various topics under discussion really stir up the brain cells that have settled down lately to think only about work and home...More

Himmler and his Aryan theories

It was after 1936. Heinrich Himmler, the one man responsible for the murder of over half a million people, had become the Reichsfuhrer and had just founded the Ahnenerbe (Ancestral heritage) department in the Nazi machinery...More