Bahadur was a legend. A hero and a saviour and we, the children, looked up to him. His unconventional ways charmed us; his bravado, when chasing away the neighbour’s menacing Pomeranian, and swearing to take revenge against those pesky little mutts for having chased down his children, protected us; his magical ways with which he... Continue Reading →
How I love the lyrical rhythm, flow, and emotions, concealed and glaring, in the phrase, the lives of others. Ruminating over the romanticism of the words, I am reminded of having read a namesake book ‘The Lives of Others’ penned by Booker nominated Neel Mukherjee a couple of years ago. Amazed and fascinated that I... Continue Reading →
“You know it’s not the same as it was”, croons Harry Styles plaintively in his recent song. And metamorphosing into a comforting earworm, the song, layered with vintage shades of nostalgia and what seems like a tribute to the bygone times, literally and figuratively, quite unprepared, teleports me into a labyrinth, brown and purple, of... Continue Reading →
When I was fifteen most of my classmates, during reading sessions in the classroom, began exhibiting signs of their voices cracking, much to their embarrassment and much to a loud guffaw that followed every time a squeak escaped their vocal cords. Puberty explained our biology teacher to a classroom of about fifty boys. Uncannily enough... Continue Reading →
Yes, I earnestly miss going to the mall! Ah, do not presume that I adore spending all my hours aimlessly wandering inside the glitzy and glamourous blinding lights of a mall and do not erroneously assume that I devote all my energy indulging in window-shopping, faire du lèche-vitrines, literally licking windows as the French like... Continue Reading →
‘Rain, rain go away, come again some other day’, I distinctly remember these lines from a silly song we would sing as children when at school. Confined inside the classroom, we would solemnly stare at the non-stop patter and listen to the drops crashing upon the tinned roof. Will the rain ever stop, someone would... Continue Reading →
Two days ago, India celebrated her 73rd Republic Day-a day when the constitution came into force in the seventh largest in the world, second largest if one were to consider the population (or is it the largest, one can never ascertain owing the many misses in the survey), and a country that boasts of being... Continue Reading →
The rain makes it impossible to go about my chores, Maa, my mother would complaint each morning during the months of monsoon when the cold, silvery coils of rainwater unfurled upon the gentle hills of my sleepy hometown. Washed clothes don’t dry and smell musty, the rainwater finds ingenious ways to drip inside the house... Continue Reading →
The previous year, when I sit and ruminate over the months that were, although three hundred and sixty-five days, from a spring spent by the beach and upon the mountains to a pandemic summer, to rains that never ended until December, save some days of desert sun, and a white Christmas spent with everyone I... Continue Reading →
“Time passes, and yet it doesn’t pass; people come and go, the mountains remain. Mountains are permanent things. They are stubborn, they refuse to move. You can blast holes out of them for their mineral wealth; or strip them of their trees and foliage; or dam their streams and divert their currents; or make tunnels... Continue Reading →