Ormakkayi – Kozhikode Abdul Khader

Actually I was humming the Yesudas song ‘Pachapanam thatte’ and my mother in law who is visiting us said, can you add that to the CD you are making for me? At that time, I did not know this was originally a drama song done by Abdul Khader for Baburaj many decades ago nor did I know of the debate in…

Tick Tock Doc, Santos and Cartier

You can locate him on Google, but I saw him by chance. My watch needed a new battery, and like usual, I popped open the back and changed the battery myself, realizing only then that it was a snap open back that required much force to click it back in. It required what they call a watch press, I did…

Auto's in Davos

When our dear friends in Switzerland sent us this photo with the cryptic note that said it all, I decided to check it out. Some time back I had written about Indian Autorickshaws in the UK. Well they were recently to Davos, where the World Economic forum is held every year, an occasion where the bi…

Chapatti club and ‘Desi’ bacteria

It is always difficult when you keep moving from one place to another. Bereft of friends, you struggle through the first years, trying to maintain perspective. You then end up comparing the places you left with the place you arrived at and almost always find that the other side of the shore was gre…

Chase, Gardner & L’amour

I am not so sure that children and teenagers read so much these days, can’t blame them though, with so much of TV and outside activities, where is the time? Not only that, the amount of studying they have to do to keep on top of things is making their life, unfortunately hectic. But well, it was qui…

Mehaboob - that forgotten singer

For quite some time I searched around for information on the Malayalam singer Mehaboob, but only a little could be dredged. It was finally a brilliant, thought provoking and sentimental article by novelist Vennala Mohan in last years ‘Manorama Onappathippu’ that gave me much insight to this lovable…