I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. I am sipping black tea with a tinge of sugar (just decoction, as they called it), sitting on the stone bench in front of a small shop selling groceries in a village called Devi Gere. I have just finished my bottle […]
The last time I came to Ooty was when I was graduating from high school. I was a certified loner then, and I remember thinking that my biggest fear then was if anyone would agree to be my roommate. I don’t remember anything of Ooty. Not its hills, not its climate, not its gorgeous chocolates. […]
I am sitting cross-legged in a fairly large meditation hall, my knees resting awkwardly on two pillows. I am propped up on two other pillows. Outside, I hear birds and a grass-cutting machine hypnotically whirring its way through. Inside the hall, someone coughs. I hear the person next to me deeply sigh. I bend over, […]
It’s morning but the heat is already enervating. A dry, barren plain stretches out before me. The air is dry. The landscape almost like a surreal scene from a dystopian flick. The odd patch of green struggling against the aridness. Your car turns the corner, off the Sholapur-Pune highway, onto a rough road, and then […]
The last few days of this year. A year that has been a shard of revolving dust, a whirlwind of chaos and mindless energy. As the year winds down, I can’t but think of the things that made me happy through the year. It’s difficult to do so. Our mind has a tendency to shut […]
Ramanagara, off the Bangalore-Mysore highway, is now the new hotspot for birdwatchers, rock-climbers, and coffee crashers. This place is known for its silkworm rearing, and of course, THAT scene from THAT Hindi blockbuster, Sholay, but of late, its rocky terrain has attracted more trekkers and climbers than silkworm farmers. I have neither trekked nor climbed […]
I stay in one of Bangalore’s more recently developed ‘IT hubs.’ The area there is chaotic. The air an unfiltered hell of poison. The people speak to me in Hindi more often than not. Traffic is not the word you can use to describe a 1,000 vehicles trying to squeeze past each other in a […]
I think the title of this blog post just about sums up the day. The mornings in Goa here have been always sunny. No trace of clouds. But slowly or in an instant, depending on the mood, the tide turns, and the clouds gather. In an instant, you can go = from scorching sun to […]
The sun is playing a game here. Kissing the clouds. Pushing them away. Rain here. And then rain no more. Vagator doesn’t have much in the way of ‘seeing.’ It’s just an ordinary beach, if you really want to describe the serenity of the ocean in such manner. But there is a ruggedness to the […]
I think there is something to settings that makes you write. It’s not enough to write, you should go where the muse calls you. Maybe VS Naipaul would not have been able to compile his award-winning novels if he was told to sit in the middle of MG Road or Sarjapur Road, right near the […]