Island express

I was trying to rent a house in Bangalore (this is a story from the mid 80’s), there were no apartments those days, only houses and my search was not so ably assisted by the few regular estate agents (brokers – that’s what they were called then) around as I was a bachelor (Persona Non Grata of cour…

Turtles can fly

If you have not seen this movie, try and get hold of a copy and spend a couple of hours watching a heart wrenching beautiful movie. A movie with a cast almost entirely made up of children 2-13 years old, you wonder how the Iranian Kurd director Ghobadi managed to get out such performances from the…

Highway of death

The soldiers were huddled in the TATA bus taking them back to Baghdad; they had enough of Saddam’s misadventure into Kuwait. Many of them had been involved in the torture and subjugation of the rich Kuwait and her subjects, but after months of that, they were happy to head for home. Bags of clothe…

Fire Walking

I still remember the Mariamman temple in our village in Palakkad, Mariamman is the mother god who controls all kinds of Poxes, fertility and so on!!. Being close to the Tamilnadu border meant that a lot of the culture blends in those regions, we had a number of Tamil customs, a lot of the farm labo…

Duck and Duct tape

It was again a story from my days in Florida, I was reading articles on sticky tape shortages after the Homeland security ‘Orange alert’ announcements and I wondered, ‘what a situation this is, are people really thinking these days or being paranoid’? I was in warm South Florida, and thinking of th…

Sangada Mukku (Crying Corner)

As one drives along the Mathaar(airport) street to the old city centre Al Bathaa in Riyadh, typically on a Thursday evening, he starts to sense a different vibrancy from the rest of Riyadh. While you would hardly see a soul on a hot summer day on the streets of Riyadh, save some labourers toiling o…

The Ahmedpur train story

Many years ago, I read this story in a magazine called Imprint... The magazine is not in print these days... But I found it on the net ... Another reference to this story is the article linked. It has more examples on the use and misuse of English http://fecolumnists.expressindia.com/full_column.ph…

A Turkish bath

Have you have experienced a Turkish bath? I can assure you, it is an unforgettable and pleasant experience. Mine was, of course an original, in Turkey. Hammam is Turkish for public baths (remember the soap we had in India?). Venkat and I were spending a hot summer’s day loitering around along the S…

Midnight express

Who has seen the movie Midnight express with Brad Davis ? (here is a review for those interested) http://www.prisonflicks.com/reviews.php?filmID=61 If you have, i must say two things 1- the movie is pretty good 2- the movie portrays Turks in the wrong light having lived in Turkey for some 5 years an…