Next in the queue
Queues and the word ‘next’ are as clichéd as a politician hopping from one party to another. Opting for a title submerged in clichés doesn’t mean though that an original idea won’t suddenly pop up to surprise you. But let me just say that the idea for this title came when I heard someone ask...
A quikr relocation to Bangalore
‘You remember all the times we have relocated?’ I asked Specky. She looked at me, smiled and said, ‘But you always linked relocation with sparkling excitement.’ This was true. I have always believed that relocating rekindles our spirit to explore, to discover, to go out and transform all the passivity in life into action that...
Both passion and resolution must be sizeable
Being fit has been a passion for years… but these past few years have made my body weight do a high jump and so I’m now a formidable 85kg. ‘Come on, lots of people are 85 and they aren’t fat!’ is what you might tell me. But listen, they weren’t 57 kg just six years...
Melbourne really is psychic
Yes, this city does tend to enter and travel through your synapses and into the layers of your mind faster than you would imagine… and I am talking about the effect based on my online exploration of the city. Yes, I’ve been to Sydney and the memories of that trip remain fresh, unjaded, and full...
You forced your way in
I don’t know about you, but I have distorted facts, hidden them, and even lied outright more times than the number of years I have lived. Yes, there were small and big perceived advantages that must have come my way… a sales target completed, some more time gained before I submitted my reports, or an...
There’s a lot of poetry in sex
Relationships creatively thrive on uncovering ‘the unheard melodies’, if I may be permitted to quote Wordsworth here… and we know of poets allowing their minds to venture forth to touch, caress, and mate with an idea before they are able to whisk it with words to write immortal lines. The sequence of the writing of...
Never finished, only abandoned
Pre-marital sex has always been an exciting topic for discussions… never finished, only abandoned. Sex, pre-marital or otherwise, ‘is a kind of magic spell; it demands complete abandon; if words or movements oppose the magic of caresses, the spell is broken’ (Simone De Beauvoir)… and it is difficult not to agree to this existentialist from...
My dream has been killed
What you may never have seen or heard That right above where you see that bird Ghosts from the past come, perch, and watch us. Yesterday one of them spoke a word: ‘Listen!’ And I shut all else and heard A few horrified ghost sounds say: ‘Yes! We know now that once dead we are...
‘I’ means a lot
When I say ‘I means a lot’, I mean a lot. I mean a life. I mean a life that is safe. I mean a life that is safe despite the hazards on our roads. I mean the roads. I mean the roads that I walk or drive on. I mean the rules. I mean...
FARE. FEAR. REAF. FERA.
Let us play a game. Take a few random alphabets and rearrange them into a word that makes sense… then make another one… and another one… I generally find that anagrams make me less fearful of even the most fearsome words. I chose A-E-F-R and one of the words that I made, was FEAR. Now...
The impressions
As I walked by a pile of garbage lying unattended in an otherwise clean market in Delhi, I heard a well-to-do woman say, ‘We Indians are instinctively unhygienic.’ I stopped, looked at her with a smile that clearly said ‘hear me out’. She instinctively stopped and her body language said ‘I’m ready to hear your...
The time to change has arrived
The year was 1990. I was on my motorcycle near ISBT on the ring road in Delhi. An old couple on a Vespa scooter slipped and fell… and a few cars screeched to stop, swerve and go their way. I parked my motorcycle on the side and ran to the dazed couple, helped them get...
