Random Thoughts

As I write this, I can smell rain. You know that smell. Dig deep into your olfactory memories. It is that smell at the onset of the monsoon season. For those of you who have never experienced a real monsoon, it is that smell when rain falls on parched land. It releases that smell. I don't know if it has a word to describe it, but I know what it is. Well, my nose does. The first time I read the God of Small Things I wanted to get on a plane and go home. Arundhati Roy does a brilliant job of describing the rain and Kerala in general. That home exists only in my mind, but anyway. In the midst of an unprecedented draught, rain is finally falling on this parched rain forest. I am so happy. Back to the story at hand. Another happy story. As a child, I would have been looking forward to the 10 or so days off at this time of the year (well, it depends on something called a sidereal solar calendar which isn't in sync with the Gregorian calendar we use). People would make these elab...

I shall be home. Some day.  But I'll keep my distance from the pachyderm.  With a  Swedish Model (Miriam Ilorah) providing the sights and a Senagalese composer and singer (Baaba Maal) providing the vocals... home is a hard thing to figure out.

I've been reading more and more of late on Physics and Physicists and the sorts of work conducted in the recent past. I had come across this Airtel ad a while back which goes into some detail about the many people who have made India what it is and it got me thinking... what will be the names they use in the future? The ad is a bit off... for example, there were many others (like Tesla and Marconi) working on radio communication during the same time as Bose... It is truly amazing to me to look into the fascinating contribution of physicists from India. People such as Jagdish Chandra Bose and his namesake Satyendra Nath Bose (after whom the quantum physics particle boson is named) have made incredible contributions to our understanding of our world. But they are just some of the great names that come from the sub-continent. Still others like Ramanujan show a fascinating side of humanity; the need to learn, the need to be curious. I am a big fan of the advertising agency that does Ai...

I've been thinking of all the fruits I was used to as a kid in India. I have not seen most of them for a long while now. I was talking about a pomegranate I ate recently to someone and I thought I'd go about listing the fruits. So then, lets start with the pomegranate. Its a strange one alright. Did you know that the Afghans are now shipping crates of these to Vancouver and other areas? It is a bright red fruit that tastes somewhat sour but is awesome to eat. And its good for you. Then there is the creamy Sapodilla. I have never seen it in North America. Apparently the plant itself is a native of Mexico. Either those facts are incorrect or people don't eat it for whatever reason. This thing grows like wild back home and I remember having tonnes of them on dining table fruit baskets... sometimes going rotten, or over-ripe. There is the guava with its coarse flesh inside. With little seeds on the inside. Again, endemic to Mexico and yet, I have not encountered any in the Unit...

Its almost 60 years since India won her independence from Great Britain. I have been a big fan of history of all sorts and my people's history is something that I am very interested in. When I was born, India was a country run by the Congress party and a Gandhi was in charge. Its quite funny that 26 years or so later, another Gandhi (an Italian one) is running the show in the background. In the meantime, the country has changed and improved by leaps and bounds. But what about from 60 years ago? I have read a lot that many of the founding fathers of our country have written over time... I can only imagine the anticipation, the hope and the dreams of many Indians who are on the brink of that day. Remember what Nehru said? He said, "L ong years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedo...