My dosa disasters
My mother and I shared a love-hate relationship. I always felt that she favoured my brothers, and I came second to her sons. This was something I never stopped fighting about. And my most vehement argument towards…
My soft hands
Around me there is a frenzy of women getting dressed in glittery paraphernalia. The chatter is amusing and boisterous. We are all excited about yet another pre-wedding ritual. I reach out for my glass bangles. Red. To…
Pulling those strings
The year was 2008. It was a cold winter in the heart of London. I was spending a lonely weekend in my hostel room. When suddenly the contents of an email warmed the cockles of my heart.…
These walls will melt
“I would prefer to share the apartment with a woman— preferably an Indian or a Pakistani,” I wrote. I was sending an email to the Netherlands to request student accommodation. I was going to spend three weeks that summer at…
Thinking-vinking in another language
The year was 1975. St Joseph’s Convent, Bangalore. It was lunch time in the nursery school where I studied. I was all of four years old. Each teacher sat on the grass in the school lawns in…
Discovering the pinnacle of love
On one of my visits to Pondicherry, after my mandatory visit to the Aurobindo Ashram, I stepped into their book shop and brought a laminated poster. It was called ‘Radha’s prayer’. It was originally written by The…
The lost genre of letter writing
Somewhere in the late eighties, Doordarshan had telecast a fourteen-episode children’s serial called Kachchi Dhoop. It was Amol Palekar’s directorial venture which was loosely adapted from Louisa May Alcott’s book ‘Little Women‘. It was the story of…
Idhar khuda hai
I exit from the lift and look frantically for a place to sit. There is no seating arrangement in place. I refresh the NTES app on my phone. At least an hour more of waiting. I have…
Wardha East ke famous vade
There is a serene calm about small railway stations. My favourite railway station is Sewagram. It is always clean, never cramped with crowds and has that open spacious feel to it. I love to wait there and…
Moving away from Eponyms
The Oxford English Dictionary defines an eponym as “a person after whom a discovery, invention, place, etc., is named or thought to be named”. Medicine is full of diseases and syndromes named after people who described something. You…
