The Hindu has a piece on the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, known as the 'toy train' which runs up from Mettupalayam to Ooty: Chug alon...

I love Poetry Daily . I don't always love the poems, but I liked today's very much -- by Srikanth Reddy, from his book Facts for Vi...

Rangachari Anand has written a good piece on how South Indian names work. South Indian names confuse non-Indians, and even North Indians...

We saw a Hindi film called Ijaazat , with lyrics by Gulzar. One song began, The night has come empty-handed... I found the lyrics at Alf...

When Gujaratis want to praise something, they may say, “ Bohu fine che ,” “It’s very fine.” I haven’t heard ‘fine’ in Tamil, but in the la...

I was going through some old bits of paper and found this poem, which I probably copied from the New Yorker , before I ever imagined that I ...

From Sanskrit Poetry From Vidyakara's Treasury , translated by Daniel H. H. Ingalls: 226 In the paddy field flooded with fresh water ...

US intelligence fears Iran duped hawks into Iraq war I could laugh, if I weren't already screaming. And please don't miss Chala...

(The minute I declared a hiatus, my fingers began to itch for the keyboard. Let's see...) An article in the paper recently urged peop...

Amul, which makes dairy products, has a long tradition of referring to current events in their billboards. Many are light-hearted. Some ar...

Time for a hiatus, I think.

Y called and asked if we’d like to see a shooting, for a Tamil TV serial. We drove to his house around noon. It’s in a big compound -- a l...

I have a romantic view of the sea. I was reminded of that not very unusual fact just now, reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez's memoir, Livi...

refrigerator magnet poetry : make your own poem. (It's for kids,so it has lots of animals and play words, but I'm having fun with ...

From The New Indian Express : A piece of past left suspended in the thick of modernity SALEM: A whiff of the Raj days engulfs you as you...

Recently Ramesh advised me never to say, " Chor do ," which means "leave it," or "never mind," or "forget...

Shocked to the root like the lilac bush in the vacant lot by the hurricane -- whose black branch split by wind or rain has broken ou...

We’re eating mangoes from our own tree for the first time – langras, from Calcutta. They’re small, and have a slightly chemical under-tang,...

I wanted to write something clever, or rueful, or quirky -- all half-feelings -- but I just can't seem to do it today. Here's an ar...

I love this picture, from today's Indian Express : First of all, you might wonder why the gent on the left is wearing sunglasses wh...