Polyester? No thanks

The old woman lifts up a polyester dress, holds it against herself, shakes her head, and drops it back into the pile. No, it won’t fit. No, it’s not me. No, I don’t like polyester. No, I wear saris, not dresses. No, not even a tsunami will make me wear want someone else’s discards. Which [...]

Fire down below

From the fire behind me, there is an awful “pop”. Something has exploded in it, and given that I know what’s in the fire, I know what the pop is likely to be: some part of a human body, consumed by the flames. I’ve watched those bodies being piled onto the pyre, and the last [...]

Early warning

My article on the tidal wave disaster on rediff.com.

Violated norms

From a friend who has worked for years on the Andaman/Nicobar islands. He repeated this when I called him.
—
This might sound premature and callous, but every developmental and environmental norm has been violated in the isalnds over the last couple of decades. A lot of the loss of life has been due to this. I [...]

TV, tsunamis and too many dead

My father, who doesn’t have cable, called up Doordarshan, the TV channel you can still get through the air. Anxious to know out more about the tragedy that slammed into South and Southeast Asia, he was hoping to find it on his TV. “When will you carry your next news bulletin?” he asked.
“Oh, we don’t [...]

Tales From Some Baug

I’m not a fan of posts that contain just a pointer or three. But Sue Darlow’s photographs of Parsis (on that site till January 11) are simply outstanding. I found them deeply moving, and was also captivated by her use of light and colour. Don’t miss the delicate shot of five seated women.

Notes for a standup routine

My wife, she teaches French. Likes all things French. Most especially, cheese. In France, cheeses come with these crazy names that leave me baffled.
She’ll yell “Do you want chevre cheese?” And I’ll say “Sure I want to share cheese, but watch your grammar!” And she’ll say “Leave my grandma out of this, OK? My grandpa [...]

Moments of Epiphany

Complete darkness, and I’m walking along in driving rain, through mud and fields, unable to see any kind of path, unable to see my companion only a few feet ahead of me, heading for a town called Bargi Nagar. It’s next to the Bargi dam on the Narmada river in central India. From here where [...]

Look to the Stints

Through my window, through the trees, I can see them. In their blue and white uniforms, arms and legs scissoring in attempted unison, they make their ponderous way around the nearby park. They try hard, but really they cannot coordinate their movements, and the arms, specially, are a blur of out-of-time swinging.
It’s that time of [...]

Alfalfa: The Naked Truth

Party at a friend’s place. Several new faces there; I met most as the party went on. One was, I found at one point, surrounded by a small group. As I strolled up to listen to what was going on, I heard him asking, and this is verbatim: “Which is the only word in the [...]