NavDharmyug

I am currently reading Letters by Kurt Vonnegut. It is an amazing collection of letters, loaded splendid wit and amazingly disarming honesty. I have been off and on worrying about the dying art of letter writing, in spurts. Last I went into bout of sadness about the fact that no one writes letter anymore was when I had heard the rendition of the letters of Ghalib, the great Urdu poet, in the magnetic and soulful voice of an equally great Urdu writer, poet of the day, Gulzaar. What imagery, what honesty, wrapped in such shiny, twinkling couplets like " Jamaa karate ho kyun, raqeebon ko/ yeh tamaasha hua, gilaa Naa hua" (Translation- The way you gather those who strive and compete with me for your love to listen to the woes of our love/ Turns what would be Otherwise a plateful banter Between two lovers Into a vulgar spectacle) The visual description and verbal imagery transports you into a different world, when you read and imagine Ghalib writ...

Winters are lovely times. There is nothing as magical as the snuggle in a jaipuri blanket with your little one. It is difficult to get out of the blanket in Delhi winter, even to watch the tempting television debates, with most articulate aggression one can get. The sun is mild, and the green in the neighbourhood park looks fresh as a child. Days are not yet unkind, though chill has made appearance in the dawn. The most agonising part of the winters is the mornings when the kids have to be readied for school, which Nonu dutifully misses at least three days in a week, much to the chagrin of her mother. I, as silent co-conspirator to this, on account of my own sloth and my distaste to what appears to me as unnecessary torture to the little one in the name of organised education, cooperate in her staying at home oftentimes. In fact, had a discussion with her mother today on this, and when I contested, stating the I could even sail through my engineering with shaky attendances, and in th...