Mental Excursions

A historic connection Uzbekistan Diary -1 Left: India's second Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri's bust Right: Street named after him (Tashkent, Uzbekistan) Two weeks ago, I had announced that I would be travelling and travel I did to a new foreign land, which Mani, a history buff, had for long wanted to visit, but which is still not explored/exploited much by visitors-especially west Europeans and Americans, i.e., Uzbekistan. We travelled with four others - a friend couple, their son, and a colleague. Two members of our group were nursing knee and foot injuries, so it is not a surprise that we did not visit as many places as we would have otherwise. I am, however, grateful that they were brave and supportive enough to not have the trip aborted. Our visit was only a week long and in the coming weeks I shall take you along on my journey of the four cities, including the places, people, food, shopping anything that sparked interest and stayed in my memory (no intellectual anal...

Good times are coming! You might not agree with me when I say that good weather is slowly coming. I can understand if you associate winter in north India with smoke or haze, created by air pollution; delayed flights, trains running late, traffic jams due to poor visibility in fog/smog. Smog in Delhi You might talk of the larger issue of stubble burning which is now becoming an annual issue like the floods and the government (any and every) has yet to do something about. A friend believes that in the colder months, life becomes dull because nobody wants to move out of the zone of warmth whether it is near the electric heater, a log fire, sitting in the sun or under the weight of a stuffed razai (quilt). Food gets cold fast, clothes or anything else for that matter, don’t dry, But feeling cold is a very subjective thing. When we were living in Chennai where the weather fluctuates between hot, hotter and hottest, with the minimum day temperature at 24 degrees C in late December...

A novice’s narrative of a cricket match! The joyous winners Photo: Mint Last Sunday in Lucknow, India beat England by 100 runs in the ICC Men’s World Cup, 2023 series. You would already have heard about it, seen the action on the ground or on TV, read about it, rerun some videos, and conducted a post-mortem! Yet, when a friend suggested that I, a cricket non-fan, share my observations as a spectator of the scene outside the ground, I thought why not, even though it would not be as exciting as the game actually was. Watching it live was a mega-picnic with a noisy crowd of nearly 50,000  participants who had managed to reach there after a long hurdle race. The parking was a couple of kilometres away. You trudged the distance to pass through several barricades, showing your tickets at every point. Iron barricades and uniformed personnel made one feel more like you were coming out of prison on parole and not going in to watch a fun game. Several hands at various points of entrance ...