From rollicking to rolling and back
There are two kinds of people that I know of. The first sort asks everyone: ‘How do you spend your weekend?’ and goes around bumbling into a web of plans that others have made and I call him one who is brain-dead. This person usually asks his friends, relatives, distant relatives, and sometimes even strangers...
Seen them all, he said. Really, I asked?
Between seeing and seeing again lies an entire universe of change. Changes happen faster than one blinks an eye. What this means is that one visit is never going to be enough. Not ten. Not even a hundred visits. There will always be some new addition or some perceptive insight that wasn’t there in past...
Reviews are not for the creator
I consider God to be the master creator. He is a writer, poet, illustrator, caricaturist, doodler, inventor, explorer, scientist, and someone who is forever pushing in surprising products. Like, for instance, a few days back the newspapers were talking about strange species in the deepest part of the oceans and some of them were yet...
Freedom to disagree isn’t dead in India
Many may not be aware but there was a time when the Coffee House on the top floor of Mohan Singh Place on Baba Khadak Singh Marg near Connaught Place in New Delhi was the place where one could overhear a wide range of revolutionary and radical ideas. There were known and unknown writers, struggling...
Learning, age, and a bar
If some readers are wondering why I decided to let the title have ‘a bar’ in it, the reason is simple. I have always believed that getting into sticky situations is an addiction for humans. I mean, we cannot live without bumbling and stumbling into one ever so often. Quite obviously then, finding a way...
Condensed milk, rooh-afza, and water from a mountain stream
It was at an art exhibition that I realized what hunger could mean. The walls were a pale ivory, the lights were sufficient and diffused, and the art panels were all in innumerable hues of black and grey. There was no one around when I entered and coming in after driving through the colour dense...
I still love my Parker Frontier
Last week I sat at a press event and was busy writing probable questions with my Parker Frontier fountain pen in my black Moleskine notebook when a twenty-something YouTuber whispered in my right ear, ‘Is that an ink pen?’ ‘Yes, it is,’ I said and looked up towards him. He said nothing but his expression...
Cricket and laughter go together in India
Cricket and laughter co-exist… at least sometimes. Yes, we have seen the famous yawn behind the wickets in CWC 2019 and Sarfaraz was trolled like mad for days. The televised matches make sure that every yawning gap between a ball rushing towards the boundary and a fielder diving valiantly to miss it by millimeters, the...
Happiness is hearing that silent roar
Only a few minutes back when I searched for the nail-cutter to trim my nails, I noticed that the left index finger had that tell-tale black-ink mark made during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. A little later once the nails were done I discovered that the black-ink mark now looked like a tiger’s triangular stripe...
I don’t want to be like you
Days have this strange habit of throwing different sorts of people towards you… and this is why I call them fun to be with. I mean earth days, of course. Not sure if this happens on other distant planets as well, but here on earth, I can open a sleep laden eye and see Specky,...
Everything means nothing
Armies of specialists have taken over. Consultants are grabbing all there is to grab. Experts walk around with pedestals looking for a place to set up their shop. You really need to be a wizard in one thing or the other to get attention. Survival is difficult if you cannot prove that you are an...
The day I met Gandhi
Yes indeed, I met Gandhi a few days back. No, not the one who just wants to be left alone by his political friends. Neither any of the hundreds who go around with the Gandhi surname dangled around their existence. I met the real Gandhi. The one we all know as Mohan Das Karamchand Gandhi....
