Posts
I can't believe I'm actually blogging this, but here goes:
Read Aamir Khan's interview with Tehelka at:
http://www.tehelka.com/story_main17.asp?filename=hub040106Mainstream_CS.asp
(With these kind of links I'm never sure if the link will be valid a few weeks from now: I distrust stuff that ends in .asp)
Here's a celebrity who is giving a sensible interview and an intelligent one and is making a point that urgently needs to be made but which no one else seems to care about: the media in India is going to the dogs. Consumerist running dogs.
Okay, I like dogs, so let's rephrase that: the media in India is down in the garbage dump.
My pet fetish is, of course, the quality of writing, or rather the lack thereof; but even if one was to excuse the appalling grammar, spastic punctuation and ludicrous spelling mistakes, the actual content of 90% of today's newspapers and tv channels is pure drivel.
It's the sort of stuff no self-respecting cat would want to bring home. If fish-and-chips shops attempted to wrap their offerings in these newspapers, the fish would jump back in the water, batter and all, and the chips would re-assemble themselves into potatoes and roll away. I am sometimes tempted to apologise to my tv set for subjecting it to such vapid tripe.
Mr Khan has risen in my esteem considerably for speaking sense and speaking it well.
Friday, March 31, 2006
Living on a prayer. Or not.
The New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/31/health/31pray.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin) informs me that a "Long-Awaited Medical Study Questions the Power of Prayer". It goes on to say:
"Prayers offered by strangers had no effect on the recovery of people who were undergoing heart surgery, a large and long-awaited study has found.
"And patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of post-operative complications like abnormal heart rhythms, perhaps because of the expectations the prayers created, the researchers suggested.
"Because it is the most scientifically rigorous investigation of whether prayer can heal illness, the study, begun almost a decade ago and involving more than 1,800 patients, has for years been the subject of speculation."
And they've spent $2.3 million on this so far.
You just gotta love Americans, scientists and American scientists.
Something about this whole scenario intrigues me: using science to investigate whether religion works. That's like appointing a teetotaller as a wine-taster. Or putting a vegetarian in charge of Angus Steak House's kitchen. It can be done, but what would be the point?
If you have faith, no amount of scientific study is going to convince you otherwise. And if you don't, then you don't need the scientific study anyway. Not this particular one, that is.
"Prayers offered by strangers had no effect on the recovery of people who were undergoing heart surgery, a large and long-awaited study has found.
"And patients who knew they were being prayed for had a higher rate of post-operative complications like abnormal heart rhythms, perhaps because of the expectations the prayers created, the researchers suggested.
"Because it is the most scientifically rigorous investigation of whether prayer can heal illness, the study, begun almost a decade ago and involving more than 1,800 patients, has for years been the subject of speculation."
And they've spent $2.3 million on this so far.
You just gotta love Americans, scientists and American scientists.
Something about this whole scenario intrigues me: using science to investigate whether religion works. That's like appointing a teetotaller as a wine-taster. Or putting a vegetarian in charge of Angus Steak House's kitchen. It can be done, but what would be the point?
If you have faith, no amount of scientific study is going to convince you otherwise. And if you don't, then you don't need the scientific study anyway. Not this particular one, that is.
Well, that was fun!
My previous blog on authors I have loved was an enjoyable romp through my memories. I started it intending to briefly comment on V.S. Naipaul's chutzpah and to list some authors that I found tedious.
But as I tried to remember the authors I found unmemorable - oxymoronic attempt, if ever there was one - the authors who have brought me so many hours of enjoyment just kept popping up in my train of thought, like prairie dogs or whack-a-moles.
What started out as a rant became a rave.
Ce'st la vie. (And I still can't do the accent on the 'e'.)
But as I tried to remember the authors I found unmemorable - oxymoronic attempt, if ever there was one - the authors who have brought me so many hours of enjoyment just kept popping up in my train of thought, like prairie dogs or whack-a-moles.
What started out as a rant became a rave.
Ce'st la vie. (And I still can't do the accent on the 'e'.)
Nay, Paul, here are a few of my favourite pens
Or possibly, Nahi, pal.
Nobel Laureate Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul ("Surajprasad" sounds more like my corner paanwalla than a Nobel-man) has seen fit to tear into some icons of English literature including stalwarts such as Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Ernest Hemingway and Jane Austen. Mark Twain and H.G. Wells are apparently treated with more deference. In the past he has also trashed E.M. Forster and his own acolyte, Paul Theroux.
Where Naipaul roams, I shall not fear to tread.
Authors whose books I have begun then flung from me in disgust, usually before getting through a third of the book: Arundhati Roy, James Joyce, Shobha De (and no I won't chuck in an extraa 'a' or an accent on the 'e' - I'm frugal that way), Umberto Eco (except for The Name of the Rose).
Authors whom I cordially detest, but at least I made it through their books: Sidney Sheldon, Jeffrey Archer, John Grisham, Jonathan Kellerman, and all the other airport authors. You buy 'em at the airport, you read 'em on the flight (thus inviting deep vein thrombosis) and you leave 'em in the seat pocket for the next unsuspecting traveller. The best you can say about them is that they're more palatable and less indigestible than the airline food.
Authors who I find either incredibly pretentious or tear-inducingly boring but I have (usually) manfully struggled through their opiate opaque opuses: Salman Rushdie, Ayn Rand, practically any Russian great you care to name. Collectively, they have probably knocked a decade off my life span.
Authors whom I devoured in my misspent youth, but now, on revisiting them in middle-age, I wonder what all the fuss was about: Leon Uris, James Clavell. This may have something to do with the size of their offerings and muscular atrophy brought on by my advancing years.
Authors whom I was force-fed in my youth, but whom I nevertheless enjoyed and returned to willingly in my adult life, though I would never have confessed that to my English teachers - that would be selling out: William Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy, Alan Paton, E.M. Forster, Ernest Hemingway.
Authors who are acknowledged "classic greats" whom I have enjoyed, often many times over: Charles Dickens, Mark Twain, H.G. Wells, Saki, Oscar Wilde, Voltaire, Arthur Conan Doyle, Alexandre Dumas, Rudyard Kipling, D.H. Lawrence, George Orwell, Jack London.
Authors who kept me awake at night when I was a boy in a hurry to finish the book so I could get to the next one, and who cares if there was school the next day or even an exam: Alistair Maclean, Oliver Strange, Louis L'Amour, Agatha Christie, whoever wrote the Biggles series (I can't imagine I've forgotten his name!), Edgar Rice Burroughs, Edgar Wallace, Leslie Charteris, John Creasey, G.K. Chesterton, Jules Verne, John Wyndham, Enid Blyton.
Authors who made me guffaw when I was young and who still make me chuckle: Frank Richards (sadly unavailable nowadays - the Billy Bunter guy), Richmal Compton, Stephen Leacock, Goscinny and Uderzo, Herge (I'd love to do the accent on this 'e', but I can't).
Worthy successors to the chuckle-inducers: Ben Elton, Stephen Fry, Tom Holt, Douglas Adams, Scott Adams, Joseph Heller (but only that one book - with a debut that brilliant any follow-up is bound to be a crashing failure).
Authors who will one day be considered "classic greats" if there's justice in this world and if global warming doesn't kill off the human species first: John Fowles, John le Carre (another accent I'd like to do on the 'e', but sadly can't), Graham Greene, Anthony Burgess, E.L. Doctorow, Robert Harris, Margaret Atwood, Julian Barnes.
Authors of "Indian fiction" - what a nauseating term - who are well worth a read: R.K. Narayan (the godfather and the one to beat), Vikas Swarup, Samit Basu (Indian science fiction and fantasy, no less!), Vikram Seth (but only his poetic epic), Shashi Tharoor.
Authors who provide me a cathartic outlet in glorious prose for my murderous instincts: Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Josephine Tey, Elizabeth George, Minnette Walters, John Dickson Carr, Rex Stout, Georges Simenon, Michael Dibdin, Ellery Queen (though he was really two guys).
Authors who provide me a cathartic outlet in hardboiled prose for my murderous instincts: Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Eric Ambler, James Cain, James Hadley Chase, Dorothy B. Hughes, Mario Puzo.
Authors who make me wonder and want to live to be four hundred and three so I can live on their worlds: Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Ben Bova, Robert Heinlein, Ursula le Guin, Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, C.J. Cherryh.
Authors who make me wonder if they're on illegal substances but who can get me high without a needle: Lewis Carroll, J.R.R. Tolkien, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ray Bradbury, Philip K. Dick (unfortunate name in Hinglish, that), Roald Dahl.
Authors who explain this incredible universe of ours and leave my head spinning: Bertrand Russell, John Gribbin, Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins, James Gleick, Roger Penrose.
But if I was left alone on this earth with only one author's works to keep me company for all of eternity, there is no author I would rather choose than P.G. Wodehouse.
Nobel Laureate Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul ("Surajprasad" sounds more like my corner paanwalla than a Nobel-man) has seen fit to tear into some icons of English literature including stalwarts such as Charles Dickens, Thomas Hardy, Ernest Hemingway and Jane Austen. Mark Twain and H.G. Wells are apparently treated with more deference. In the past he has also trashed E.M. Forster and his own acolyte, Paul Theroux.
Where Naipaul roams, I shall not fear to tread.
Authors whose books I have begun then flung from me in disgust, usually before getting through a third of the book: Arundhati Roy, James Joyce, Shobha De (and no I won't chuck in an extraa 'a' or an accent on the 'e' - I'm frugal that way), Umberto Eco (except for The Name of the Rose).
Authors whom I cordially detest, but at least I made it through their books: Sidney Sheldon, Jeffrey Archer, John Grisham, Jonathan Kellerman, and all the other airport authors. You buy 'em at the airport, you read 'em on the flight (thus inviting deep vein thrombosis) and you leave 'em in the seat pocket for the next unsuspecting traveller. The best you can say about them is that they're more palatable and less indigestible than the airline food.
Authors who I find either incredibly pretentious or tear-inducingly boring but I have (usually) manfully struggled through their opiate opaque opuses: Salman Rushdie, Ayn Rand, practically any Russian great you care to name. Collectively, they have probably knocked a decade off my life span.
Authors whom I devoured in my misspent youth, but now, on revisiting them in middle-age, I wonder what all the fuss was about: Leon Uris, James Clavell. This may have something to do with the size of their offerings and muscular atrophy brought on by my advancing years.
Authors whom I was force-fed in my youth, but whom I nevertheless enjoyed and returned to willingly in my adult life, though I would never have confessed that to my English teachers - that would be selling out: William Shakespeare, Thomas Hardy, Alan Paton, E.M. Forster, Ernest Hemingway.
Authors who are acknowledged "classic greats" whom I have enjoyed, often many times over: Charles Dickens, Mark Twain, H.G. Wells, Saki, Oscar Wilde, Voltaire, Arthur Conan Doyle, Alexandre Dumas, Rudyard Kipling, D.H. Lawrence, George Orwell, Jack London.
Authors who kept me awake at night when I was a boy in a hurry to finish the book so I could get to the next one, and who cares if there was school the next day or even an exam: Alistair Maclean, Oliver Strange, Louis L'Amour, Agatha Christie, whoever wrote the Biggles series (I can't imagine I've forgotten his name!), Edgar Rice Burroughs, Edgar Wallace, Leslie Charteris, John Creasey, G.K. Chesterton, Jules Verne, John Wyndham, Enid Blyton.
Authors who made me guffaw when I was young and who still make me chuckle: Frank Richards (sadly unavailable nowadays - the Billy Bunter guy), Richmal Compton, Stephen Leacock, Goscinny and Uderzo, Herge (I'd love to do the accent on this 'e', but I can't).
Worthy successors to the chuckle-inducers: Ben Elton, Stephen Fry, Tom Holt, Douglas Adams, Scott Adams, Joseph Heller (but only that one book - with a debut that brilliant any follow-up is bound to be a crashing failure).
Authors who will one day be considered "classic greats" if there's justice in this world and if global warming doesn't kill off the human species first: John Fowles, John le Carre (another accent I'd like to do on the 'e', but sadly can't), Graham Greene, Anthony Burgess, E.L. Doctorow, Robert Harris, Margaret Atwood, Julian Barnes.
Authors of "Indian fiction" - what a nauseating term - who are well worth a read: R.K. Narayan (the godfather and the one to beat), Vikas Swarup, Samit Basu (Indian science fiction and fantasy, no less!), Vikram Seth (but only his poetic epic), Shashi Tharoor.
Authors who provide me a cathartic outlet in glorious prose for my murderous instincts: Dorothy Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Josephine Tey, Elizabeth George, Minnette Walters, John Dickson Carr, Rex Stout, Georges Simenon, Michael Dibdin, Ellery Queen (though he was really two guys).
Authors who provide me a cathartic outlet in hardboiled prose for my murderous instincts: Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Eric Ambler, James Cain, James Hadley Chase, Dorothy B. Hughes, Mario Puzo.
Authors who make me wonder and want to live to be four hundred and three so I can live on their worlds: Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Ben Bova, Robert Heinlein, Ursula le Guin, Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, C.J. Cherryh.
Authors who make me wonder if they're on illegal substances but who can get me high without a needle: Lewis Carroll, J.R.R. Tolkien, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ray Bradbury, Philip K. Dick (unfortunate name in Hinglish, that), Roald Dahl.
Authors who explain this incredible universe of ours and leave my head spinning: Bertrand Russell, John Gribbin, Carl Sagan, Richard Dawkins, James Gleick, Roger Penrose.
But if I was left alone on this earth with only one author's works to keep me company for all of eternity, there is no author I would rather choose than P.G. Wodehouse.
Tuesday, March 28, 2006
Sandwich moment - NON
A sandwich moment in Hong Kong - New-Old-New.
A commentary on the city in a thousand words (and acres of glass).
Monday, March 27, 2006
Squirt Squiddles and Diddles
Time to welcome another blogger on board: say hello to Squirt aka Squiddly-Diddly. Squiddly-Diddly? That sounds vaguely obscene and definitely juvenile.
Well, Squirt, you're probably one and may even be the other. (I shall leave it to the reader's critical analysis to decide which is which.) Nevertheless (or maybe because thereof), you're one of my favourite people, so I shall point the world (or at least that small microcosm of intelligent and discerning readers who brave my blog) to your site, which has been featured for a couple of days in my Friends column.
It says a lot for the state of the world as I know it that I found it easier and quicker to pop in an HTML link to your site than I did to take time off and key these words.
However, there's something to be said for not being an early worm, so here's bytes in your blog!
Well, Squirt, you're probably one and may even be the other. (I shall leave it to the reader's critical analysis to decide which is which.) Nevertheless (or maybe because thereof), you're one of my favourite people, so I shall point the world (or at least that small microcosm of intelligent and discerning readers who brave my blog) to your site, which has been featured for a couple of days in my Friends column.
It says a lot for the state of the world as I know it that I found it easier and quicker to pop in an HTML link to your site than I did to take time off and key these words.
However, there's something to be said for not being an early worm, so here's bytes in your blog!
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Out in Bohemia
Bohemia, this one's for you!
I thought about linking to your blog and wondered if you'd be pleased or upset. Then I figured that if you're blogging, this comes with the territory. So expect to be linked.
And keep blogging!
As Mr Anderson says, May you find sweet inspiration, may your memory not be dull; may you rise to dizzy success, may your wit be quick and strong; may you constantly amaze us, may your answers not be wrong; May your head be on your shoulders, May your tongue be in your cheek; And most of all we pray that you may come back next week!
I thought about linking to your blog and wondered if you'd be pleased or upset. Then I figured that if you're blogging, this comes with the territory. So expect to be linked.
And keep blogging!
As Mr Anderson says, May you find sweet inspiration, may your memory not be dull; may you rise to dizzy success, may your wit be quick and strong; may you constantly amaze us, may your answers not be wrong; May your head be on your shoulders, May your tongue be in your cheek; And most of all we pray that you may come back next week!
Wednesday, March 22, 2006
Watch the elegant sound of time
I have a watch.
While awaiting my connecting flight in Bangkok, it was purchased for me.
I have owned watches before, but this one is special. Not just for the sentiment behind its purchase, for that is not for this blog.
It does not have a battery.
It ticks. It absolutely ticks!
There is an entire generation that has grown up on quartz watches that require batteries to make them go. There are variations on this theme including solar powered watches and digital ones and ones with faces that light up and others that tell you the phases of the moon and where you are in the world and whether you will meet a mysterious stranger in black tomorrow. Most of these are silent and the only noise they make is if they have an alarm function: a subdued or raucous beep, depending on their family background and upbringing.
They are accurate enough to clock atoms decaying. Or racing cars completing laps. Or lap dancers setting hearts racing.
But none of these watches tick.
Mine does.
There is something wonderfully reassuring and healthy and heart-warming when I stretch my arms behind my head for a moment's exercise at the keyboard, and as my wrist lies near my ear, my watch chatters busily but respectfully in my ear. It is an unobtrusive ticking - my wrist needs to be right next to my ear for me to hear it - but it is unmistakable. It's as if it is mimicking my heart beat, a regular life-affirming metronome.
My watch has a plain austere face: nothing showy, nothing bold. No date indicator, no second hand. Thin unobtrusive Roman numerals and anorexic hands. It tells the time. That's all that it does. It doesn't even tell me the time to the nearest second or even the nearest minute, merely the nearest five minutes.
There is a philosophical approach behind this old-fashioned method of measuring time; an acknowledgment that in our headlong rush towards productivity and efficiency and time management we have lost sight of something deeper, something more subtle.
It has a black leather strap with a simple buckle and two loops. No Velcro or elastic or clasps.
It does not command attention from the observer, but it demands attention from the owner. It is an automatic, which means I need to wear it for it to continue to work. It derives its inspiration and momentum from the movement of my arm as I go through the day. As I go through my daily life, my watch draws its sustenance from me, not from the entropy of some battery.
And it ticks to thank me for continuing to give it life. The watch has me.
While awaiting my connecting flight in Bangkok, it was purchased for me.
I have owned watches before, but this one is special. Not just for the sentiment behind its purchase, for that is not for this blog.
It does not have a battery.
It ticks. It absolutely ticks!
There is an entire generation that has grown up on quartz watches that require batteries to make them go. There are variations on this theme including solar powered watches and digital ones and ones with faces that light up and others that tell you the phases of the moon and where you are in the world and whether you will meet a mysterious stranger in black tomorrow. Most of these are silent and the only noise they make is if they have an alarm function: a subdued or raucous beep, depending on their family background and upbringing.
They are accurate enough to clock atoms decaying. Or racing cars completing laps. Or lap dancers setting hearts racing.
But none of these watches tick.
Mine does.
There is something wonderfully reassuring and healthy and heart-warming when I stretch my arms behind my head for a moment's exercise at the keyboard, and as my wrist lies near my ear, my watch chatters busily but respectfully in my ear. It is an unobtrusive ticking - my wrist needs to be right next to my ear for me to hear it - but it is unmistakable. It's as if it is mimicking my heart beat, a regular life-affirming metronome.
My watch has a plain austere face: nothing showy, nothing bold. No date indicator, no second hand. Thin unobtrusive Roman numerals and anorexic hands. It tells the time. That's all that it does. It doesn't even tell me the time to the nearest second or even the nearest minute, merely the nearest five minutes.
There is a philosophical approach behind this old-fashioned method of measuring time; an acknowledgment that in our headlong rush towards productivity and efficiency and time management we have lost sight of something deeper, something more subtle.
It has a black leather strap with a simple buckle and two loops. No Velcro or elastic or clasps.
It does not command attention from the observer, but it demands attention from the owner. It is an automatic, which means I need to wear it for it to continue to work. It derives its inspiration and momentum from the movement of my arm as I go through the day. As I go through my daily life, my watch draws its sustenance from me, not from the entropy of some battery.
And it ticks to thank me for continuing to give it life. The watch has me.
You can go back again
I'm visiting Hong Kong after 14 years.
The last time I was here the airport was a primitive shambles. My suitcase wouldn't fit into the x-ray machine so I was asked to open it while the thoola pawed through it in a bored fashion. Thoola is not a Hong Kong word. My suitcase hasn't gotten any smaller, but Hong Kong airport is now a self-described "world-class facility". World-class is somewhere above first-class but below heavenly. My suitcase no longer needs to fit into an x-ray machine: it stayed un-x-rayed as I walked out. That's the first time I've used two hyphens in one word. Hong Kong will do that to you.
When I go back to Mumbai in 5 days I will be greeted by Sahar airport that will still be a primitive shambles. Thank god for continuity.
My suitcase stayed virgo intacta but my temperature was taken as I headed for Immigration. It was done with great panache and non-intrusively. We were merely herded through a narrow corridor, three or four abreast, while infrared cameras kept a wary eye out for someone who registered Vesuvius on the red scale. I had encountered a similar camera at Shanghai airport. This seems to be a Chinese tradition since no other airport seems to care about your temperature. I feel loved and honored.
Immigration formalities at Hong Kong airport have to be the most boring in the world. The officer takes your passport and landing card, scans the first page, waits for his computer to beep, looks you in the eye searchingly, glances down at your passport photo, recognizes you, stamps your passport and hands it back to you. Some remarkable things about this exercise:
1. This is the first landing card I've seen that is in triplicate but with self-carbonized paper. Way cool.
2. No words are exchanged, not even a cursory good morning. Completely unlike, say, the US authorities who want to know if you're having a good day, how long you plan to stay around and where, why the devil you've landed up there anyway and whether you're wearing chartreuse underwear.
3. The Hong Kong Immigration officers are obviously chosen for their artistic eye and their ability to make intuitive leaps of accurate judgement. There is no other way that they could compare your face with your passport photograph and let you in to the country. It is an acknowledged fact that if people actually looked like their passport photographs, humanity would have celibated its way into extinction more than a few generations ago and we would never have needed to invent the camera. (Webster thought: Can celibate be a verb considering it refers to a lack of action?)
4. Indians do not need a visa to visit Hong Kong. This has to be the only place in the world where this is so. Let's hear it for Hong Kong! (Does this however mean that Hong Kong is not world-class, after all?)
5. The Immigration counter has a bowl of complimentary lemon mints. Never saw that at Newark.
A sign of a truly civilized airport greeted us as we sauntered nonchalantly out of Immigration: Starbucks. The force is with us. I am not one of those who turn their noses up at the concept of overpriced coffee in absurd cup sizes. I have drunk too many cups of terrible coffee in too many places to sniff at the Starbucks phenomenon.
It represents, along with MacDonald's, the triumph of standardized mediocrity over individual genius.
The Starbucks coffee may not be the best in the world - my maid at home has been trained by my wife to whip up a cup of coffee that leaves Starbucks in the dust of coffee grounds. Calling a small cup of coffee Tall is pretentious, while it may be accurate considering it holds about a liter; and calling a larger size Grande, with an "e", no less, smacks of the silliness of the local kirana shop re-christening itself "shoppe" (or worse, "shoppee").
Nonetheless, when you are 2763 miles from home as the 767 flies, it is reassuring to know what you are letting yourself in for when you part with a small fortune for a cup of java: a standard cup of coffee that tastes the same in New Jersey, Minnesota, London, Paris, Singapore and Hong Kong - no mean feat, that. And let's not forget the comfortable sofas, the stay-as-long-as-you-like ambience and the cheesecake.
I have just returned from a breakfast of a small cappucino and a medium apple turnout at the Starbucks that is next to my hotel, so that may explain some of my enthusiasm.
There has been much made of late of how Mumbai needs to transform itself into Shanghai. I think we should reset our sights and aim for Hong Kong instead. We have a lot more in common with Hong Kong, I think. For one, our shared (till recently) history of democracy. For another, narrow crowded streets. For a third, shabby rundown buildings cheek-by-jowl with tony malls and ugly residential skyscrapers that resemble concrete anthills. I could go on, but it seems that Hong Kong has all the problems that we have. Yet, they've managed to transform it into a world-class (that word again!) city without the ruthless upheaval and sweeping under the carpet that Shanghai has undergone. The city works and is clean, unlike Mumbai which today merely stutters along and is filthy.
I blog about Hong Kong but end up back in Mumbai. Maybe that's where my heart lies.
The last time I was here the airport was a primitive shambles. My suitcase wouldn't fit into the x-ray machine so I was asked to open it while the thoola pawed through it in a bored fashion. Thoola is not a Hong Kong word. My suitcase hasn't gotten any smaller, but Hong Kong airport is now a self-described "world-class facility". World-class is somewhere above first-class but below heavenly. My suitcase no longer needs to fit into an x-ray machine: it stayed un-x-rayed as I walked out. That's the first time I've used two hyphens in one word. Hong Kong will do that to you.
When I go back to Mumbai in 5 days I will be greeted by Sahar airport that will still be a primitive shambles. Thank god for continuity.
My suitcase stayed virgo intacta but my temperature was taken as I headed for Immigration. It was done with great panache and non-intrusively. We were merely herded through a narrow corridor, three or four abreast, while infrared cameras kept a wary eye out for someone who registered Vesuvius on the red scale. I had encountered a similar camera at Shanghai airport. This seems to be a Chinese tradition since no other airport seems to care about your temperature. I feel loved and honored.
Immigration formalities at Hong Kong airport have to be the most boring in the world. The officer takes your passport and landing card, scans the first page, waits for his computer to beep, looks you in the eye searchingly, glances down at your passport photo, recognizes you, stamps your passport and hands it back to you. Some remarkable things about this exercise:
1. This is the first landing card I've seen that is in triplicate but with self-carbonized paper. Way cool.
2. No words are exchanged, not even a cursory good morning. Completely unlike, say, the US authorities who want to know if you're having a good day, how long you plan to stay around and where, why the devil you've landed up there anyway and whether you're wearing chartreuse underwear.
3. The Hong Kong Immigration officers are obviously chosen for their artistic eye and their ability to make intuitive leaps of accurate judgement. There is no other way that they could compare your face with your passport photograph and let you in to the country. It is an acknowledged fact that if people actually looked like their passport photographs, humanity would have celibated its way into extinction more than a few generations ago and we would never have needed to invent the camera. (Webster thought: Can celibate be a verb considering it refers to a lack of action?)
4. Indians do not need a visa to visit Hong Kong. This has to be the only place in the world where this is so. Let's hear it for Hong Kong! (Does this however mean that Hong Kong is not world-class, after all?)
5. The Immigration counter has a bowl of complimentary lemon mints. Never saw that at Newark.
A sign of a truly civilized airport greeted us as we sauntered nonchalantly out of Immigration: Starbucks. The force is with us. I am not one of those who turn their noses up at the concept of overpriced coffee in absurd cup sizes. I have drunk too many cups of terrible coffee in too many places to sniff at the Starbucks phenomenon.
It represents, along with MacDonald's, the triumph of standardized mediocrity over individual genius.
The Starbucks coffee may not be the best in the world - my maid at home has been trained by my wife to whip up a cup of coffee that leaves Starbucks in the dust of coffee grounds. Calling a small cup of coffee Tall is pretentious, while it may be accurate considering it holds about a liter; and calling a larger size Grande, with an "e", no less, smacks of the silliness of the local kirana shop re-christening itself "shoppe" (or worse, "shoppee").
Nonetheless, when you are 2763 miles from home as the 767 flies, it is reassuring to know what you are letting yourself in for when you part with a small fortune for a cup of java: a standard cup of coffee that tastes the same in New Jersey, Minnesota, London, Paris, Singapore and Hong Kong - no mean feat, that. And let's not forget the comfortable sofas, the stay-as-long-as-you-like ambience and the cheesecake.
I have just returned from a breakfast of a small cappucino and a medium apple turnout at the Starbucks that is next to my hotel, so that may explain some of my enthusiasm.
There has been much made of late of how Mumbai needs to transform itself into Shanghai. I think we should reset our sights and aim for Hong Kong instead. We have a lot more in common with Hong Kong, I think. For one, our shared (till recently) history of democracy. For another, narrow crowded streets. For a third, shabby rundown buildings cheek-by-jowl with tony malls and ugly residential skyscrapers that resemble concrete anthills. I could go on, but it seems that Hong Kong has all the problems that we have. Yet, they've managed to transform it into a world-class (that word again!) city without the ruthless upheaval and sweeping under the carpet that Shanghai has undergone. The city works and is clean, unlike Mumbai which today merely stutters along and is filthy.
I blog about Hong Kong but end up back in Mumbai. Maybe that's where my heart lies.
Friday, March 17, 2006
Ambition, Distraction, Uglification & Derision
This is the twentieth post in this blog: so that's Ambition fulfilled - one of them, anyway. Hey, I'm easily pleased.
Distraction was provided by a front-page article in the Economic Times on how English-medium schools are teaching multiplication tables the wrong way when compared with non-English-medium schools. Apart from the point that it seems to be a slow news day when non-events make the front page, let's see what point the author, a T.K. Arun, has to make.
His (I'm presuming a gender, here) contention appears to be, and I quote:
"Six ones are six, six twos are twelve... and so on. While each term is valid in itself, together, collectively [sic] they fail to convey the idea that the term five sixes means six added together five times." He acknowledges that 5X6 has the same value as 6X5 but he goes on, "But the expression five sixes means adding 6 together 5 times, which is conceptually different from six fives, or adding five together six times."
There seems to a difference in T.K. Arun's English and mine. When I say five stones, I mean (no, not Jagger, Richards, et al) stone, stone, stone, stone and stone. 5 of 'em. When I say five beetles, I mean (no, not John, Paul etc.) beetle, beetle, beetle, beetle and beetle. 5 of 'em. So when I say five sixes, I mean (no, not Dhoni in action) six, six, six, six and six. 5 of 'em.
So I AM adding 6 together five time. What else would I be doing? Together or collectively? So much for his theory that "(the methods) fail to convey the idea that the term five sixes means six added together five times."
And of course, adding 6 together 5 times IS conceptually different from six fives, or adding five together six times, which would be - bear with me, here - five, five, five, five, five and (you guessed it) five. 6 of 'em. Compare with six, six, six, six and six. In seven words or less.
So, what the devil is his grouse? Uglification of the Indian mathematical soul, probably. His dander has been got and his umbrage has been taken by how the mighty land of the inventors of the zero (which incidentally, doesn't lend itself to multiplication) and the inheritors of Ramanujam are being sullied by the dumb white man and his language. Our patrimony is at stake and we are in imminent danger of losing our cutting edge.
No wonder this made the front page.
I assure you, Derision is the last thing on my mind.
For the literary-minded among my few readers, I trust you spotted the literary reference in the title.
Distraction was provided by a front-page article in the Economic Times on how English-medium schools are teaching multiplication tables the wrong way when compared with non-English-medium schools. Apart from the point that it seems to be a slow news day when non-events make the front page, let's see what point the author, a T.K. Arun, has to make.
His (I'm presuming a gender, here) contention appears to be, and I quote:
"Six ones are six, six twos are twelve... and so on. While each term is valid in itself, together, collectively [sic] they fail to convey the idea that the term five sixes means six added together five times." He acknowledges that 5X6 has the same value as 6X5 but he goes on, "But the expression five sixes means adding 6 together 5 times, which is conceptually different from six fives, or adding five together six times."
There seems to a difference in T.K. Arun's English and mine. When I say five stones, I mean (no, not Jagger, Richards, et al) stone, stone, stone, stone and stone. 5 of 'em. When I say five beetles, I mean (no, not John, Paul etc.) beetle, beetle, beetle, beetle and beetle. 5 of 'em. So when I say five sixes, I mean (no, not Dhoni in action) six, six, six, six and six. 5 of 'em.
So I AM adding 6 together five time. What else would I be doing? Together or collectively? So much for his theory that "(the methods) fail to convey the idea that the term five sixes means six added together five times."
And of course, adding 6 together 5 times IS conceptually different from six fives, or adding five together six times, which would be - bear with me, here - five, five, five, five, five and (you guessed it) five. 6 of 'em. Compare with six, six, six, six and six. In seven words or less.
So, what the devil is his grouse? Uglification of the Indian mathematical soul, probably. His dander has been got and his umbrage has been taken by how the mighty land of the inventors of the zero (which incidentally, doesn't lend itself to multiplication) and the inheritors of Ramanujam are being sullied by the dumb white man and his language. Our patrimony is at stake and we are in imminent danger of losing our cutting edge.
No wonder this made the front page.
I assure you, Derision is the last thing on my mind.
For the literary-minded among my few readers, I trust you spotted the literary reference in the title.
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
Holi thoughts
I've just got off the keyboard after sending an email to a young squirt of whom I am inordinately fond and I had food for thought. So I climbed back on the keyboard again.
What is it about the cell phone generation that leads them to prefer SMS and chatting to sending emails? Is it instant gratification, is it laziness, is it sloppiness, is it impetuosity, is it convenience, is it plain orneriness? A bit of all, I guess. I conducted a straw poll with others of Squirt's generation (well, a few years younger actually) and it was universal - SMS and chatting scores over email.
I guess it's a generational thing. much as I prefer emails to putting pen to paper, they prefer putting thumb to keypad.
To quote what I wrote to Squirt:
How can writing mail be a pain? In the first place you get a human-sized keyboard to bash the thing out on instead of a gnat-sized bunch of numbers masquerading as letters. Then you have a screen large enough to watch movies on and on which letters and characters assume their normal size instead of being scrunched into a space that a self-respecting flea would scoff at. Finally, a mail by its very existence speaks of thought and care and premeditation unlike an SMS that is a thing of whimsy and flightiness.
The other thing that bothers me about SMSes and chats is the way that they promote crappy spelling and absent grammar. It's all very well to say that a language is a living thing and it evolves exactly by such maltreatment. I still think it's cruel to abjure punctuation and to maul words into phonetic spellings. Phoney-tic, more like it. There's a reason that the English language does not have a phonetic script - so we can have spelling bees.
For instance, in Hindi, it would be fairly impossible to misspell a word - you pronounce it like so, you spell it like so. Boring. English is so much more exciting and unpredictable.
Apropos of languages, I also mooted an addition to the Latin vocabulary in my mail to Squirt. I'm reproducing it here as a copyright measure. Squirt was protesting my use of "Coolio" when I meant "Cool". I had to clarify:
Coolio is actually Latin. First conjugation from the infinitive cooliare, meaning to be cool; first person coolio, meaning I am cool. The other declensions are coolias, cooliat, cooliamus, cooliatis, cooliant . Meaning respectively, you are cool, he/she/it is cool, we are cool, you (plural) are cool and they are cool. Now you can impress your friends. Coolias.
What is it about the cell phone generation that leads them to prefer SMS and chatting to sending emails? Is it instant gratification, is it laziness, is it sloppiness, is it impetuosity, is it convenience, is it plain orneriness? A bit of all, I guess. I conducted a straw poll with others of Squirt's generation (well, a few years younger actually) and it was universal - SMS and chatting scores over email.
I guess it's a generational thing. much as I prefer emails to putting pen to paper, they prefer putting thumb to keypad.
To quote what I wrote to Squirt:
How can writing mail be a pain? In the first place you get a human-sized keyboard to bash the thing out on instead of a gnat-sized bunch of numbers masquerading as letters. Then you have a screen large enough to watch movies on and on which letters and characters assume their normal size instead of being scrunched into a space that a self-respecting flea would scoff at. Finally, a mail by its very existence speaks of thought and care and premeditation unlike an SMS that is a thing of whimsy and flightiness.
The other thing that bothers me about SMSes and chats is the way that they promote crappy spelling and absent grammar. It's all very well to say that a language is a living thing and it evolves exactly by such maltreatment. I still think it's cruel to abjure punctuation and to maul words into phonetic spellings. Phoney-tic, more like it. There's a reason that the English language does not have a phonetic script - so we can have spelling bees.
For instance, in Hindi, it would be fairly impossible to misspell a word - you pronounce it like so, you spell it like so. Boring. English is so much more exciting and unpredictable.
Apropos of languages, I also mooted an addition to the Latin vocabulary in my mail to Squirt. I'm reproducing it here as a copyright measure. Squirt was protesting my use of "Coolio" when I meant "Cool". I had to clarify:
Coolio is actually Latin. First conjugation from the infinitive cooliare, meaning to be cool; first person coolio, meaning I am cool. The other declensions are coolias, cooliat, cooliamus, cooliatis, cooliant . Meaning respectively, you are cool, he/she/it is cool, we are cool, you (plural) are cool and they are cool. Now you can impress your friends. Coolias.
Monday, March 13, 2006
Getting Bloggy
And now there's an addition to the Friends column. Sunshine is sharing with us her musings of an eternally restless mind. Welcome aboard!
Maybe Mugsy and Sunshine together will shame me into being more regular with this bloggety-blog thing. But they have the advantage of youth. So, maybe they won't.
Maybe Mugsy and Sunshine together will shame me into being more regular with this bloggety-blog thing. But they have the advantage of youth. So, maybe they won't.
Saturday, March 11, 2006
3 Movies and a Review
A tale of three movies: one hyped, one under the radar and one surprise package. Let's review them in the order in which I saw them.
Under the radar: Crash, an L.A. tale of intersecting destinies, racial tensions, bad guys who aren't all bad and good guys with human failings. I saw this many months ago and while I no longer recall the details, I remember walking out of the theater with a spring in my step and my head churning with thoughts and emotions - exactly what a good movie should evoke. I remember outstanding performances from Matt Dillon and Don Cheadle and a surprisingly minuscule role for Sandra Bullock, whose talents and unconventional beauty seemed wasted in an otherwise strong movie.
5 stars, 2 thumbs up and a pending DVD purchase.
Surprise package: Munich, Steven Spielberg's tale of revenge and futility. I saw this about 3 weeks ago (around the time of my last blog). Apart from Spielberg, the only other names to reckon with in the movie are Eric Bana and Daniel Craig, neither of whom are yet A-list box office stars, and the always remarkable Geoffrey Rush (fabulous in The Tailor of Panama with Pierce Brosnan). The movie narrates the efforts of a secret Israeli hit squad to assassinate 11 Palestinian terrorists or supporters in revenge for the killing of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Surprise package because this movie doesn't seem to have taken over the box office and the media the way Spielberg movies usually do. It deserves to, however.
At 3 hours this is not your edge-of-the-seat swift-paced thriller, but it has no shortage of exciting moments and nail-biting moments of tension. What it also has is a narrative that is intelligent, passionate and clear-sighted: there are no solutions here, no black and white heroes and villains; the Israelis aren't exactly super-efficient, cold-blooded killers flawlessly executing a master plan and the Palestinians aren't stupid blood-thirsty ogres. The movie neatly sidesteps all the cliches that might have littered the path of a lesser director.
There is a gently despondent air to the film, a miasma of regret at the ultimate futility of eye-for-an-eye politics and what, in the end, are immature responses to huge problems, usually of our own making. But the movie also acknowledges that this is who we are, this is what we do and even if it makes no sense, we often cannot help that we do it.
Ironies abound: a grandmotherly Golda Meir approving the revenge project and making tea for her chosen project leader while she sends him off on a quest that will destroy his soul; a mission that officially will never exist, yet that seeks to create a legend; Geoffrey Rush's self-effacing bureaucratic George Smiley persona calmly discussing the parameters of the mission while munching through a box of the Turkish sweet, baklava; the Israeli intelligence's insistence that the team produce bills if they want reimbursement of funds; the bumbling bomb-maker in the squad whose expertise is actually bomb disposal not bombing; the perfect family portrait of one of the intended victims, but that doesn't prevent him from being blown to bits; the amateur intelligence-gathering from the mercenary French underworld that lays the team open to being double-crossed and betrayed; the success of the mission that carries with it the seeds of its own failure.
A solid movie that stays with you a long, long time. 5 stars, a thumbs up and a potential DVD purchase.
Hyped: Brokeback Mountain, Ang Lee's tale of gay love in the mountains. In a word, B-o-ring. This movie has been hyped beyond belief and certainly beyond its slim capabilities. The buzz about this movie is the gay romance between two cowboys who discover deep love during a night of passion high in the mountains; a deep love that allegedly spans the next two decades while both of them get married, have children and lead otherwise heterosexual lives. I have a number of objections to this.
In the first place, they are not cowboys, they are sheep herders whose remit is to guard over a flock of sheep during the summer grazing months. The only cow who shows up in the movie has a 2-second cameo while hay is being dumped in her paddock. You can't be a cowboy without cows. Sheep somehow just don't cut it.
Secondly, the movie abounds in cars, pickup trucks and similar wheeled menaces. In the cowboy movies that I grew up watching, the only wheeled contrivances were the wagons that were circled at night to protect against marauding Indians (sorry, native Americans) and the stagecoaches that were robbed by bandits with bandanas around their faces. Something wrong, therefore, with the period of the movie.
Next, and this is critical: there is absolutely no chemistry between the leading pair. There is nothing in the story that explains why these two fall in love with each other so desperately. You might argue that love is blind and in the real world there is no reason why people fall in love with each other, but that is flimflammery. There are always reasons for love: they may not be logical reasons, but they are reasons none the less. And we're not talking about real life anyway, we're talking about the movies, which have a responsibility to tell a story and to involve the audience in that story. Watch African Queen and see the inexplicable attraction between Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn. Watch Casablanca and catch the smouldering sparks between Humphrey Bogart (again!) and Ingrid Bergman. Watch any Meg Ryan movie. Heck, even catch the normally wooden Tom Cruise with his delectable spouse (at the time, in real life too), Nicole Kidman in Eyes Wide Shut and you will see what I'm talking about when I say chemistry. Sorry, Jack and Ennis ain't got it.
Since I will now be accused of being homophobic, let me point to another gay themed movie that I consider a genuine classic: Midnight Cowboy. Enough said.
Finally, what was the story line of this unfortunate movie? Boy meets boy; they share a night of passion on a mountain top (passion, incidentally, that looks more like a bar-room brawl than gentle love - I somehow can't quite see Elton John and his beau behaving like that); they share some more days of bonding; they go their separate ways; they meet babes (Michelle Williams, by the way, is cute as a button!); they have babies; they keep meeting up over the years to rekindle their passion; one dies, the other doesn't. That's a story? Give me Hans Christan Andersen anyday.
My faith in the Oscars has been renewed after the resounding rejection of this movie at the awards. I do wonder though why Ang Lee got Best Director for this.
2 stars (for the wonderful locales), both thumbs down and I wouldn't keep this DVD if you paid me.
Under the radar: Crash, an L.A. tale of intersecting destinies, racial tensions, bad guys who aren't all bad and good guys with human failings. I saw this many months ago and while I no longer recall the details, I remember walking out of the theater with a spring in my step and my head churning with thoughts and emotions - exactly what a good movie should evoke. I remember outstanding performances from Matt Dillon and Don Cheadle and a surprisingly minuscule role for Sandra Bullock, whose talents and unconventional beauty seemed wasted in an otherwise strong movie.
5 stars, 2 thumbs up and a pending DVD purchase.
Surprise package: Munich, Steven Spielberg's tale of revenge and futility. I saw this about 3 weeks ago (around the time of my last blog). Apart from Spielberg, the only other names to reckon with in the movie are Eric Bana and Daniel Craig, neither of whom are yet A-list box office stars, and the always remarkable Geoffrey Rush (fabulous in The Tailor of Panama with Pierce Brosnan). The movie narrates the efforts of a secret Israeli hit squad to assassinate 11 Palestinian terrorists or supporters in revenge for the killing of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Surprise package because this movie doesn't seem to have taken over the box office and the media the way Spielberg movies usually do. It deserves to, however.
At 3 hours this is not your edge-of-the-seat swift-paced thriller, but it has no shortage of exciting moments and nail-biting moments of tension. What it also has is a narrative that is intelligent, passionate and clear-sighted: there are no solutions here, no black and white heroes and villains; the Israelis aren't exactly super-efficient, cold-blooded killers flawlessly executing a master plan and the Palestinians aren't stupid blood-thirsty ogres. The movie neatly sidesteps all the cliches that might have littered the path of a lesser director.
There is a gently despondent air to the film, a miasma of regret at the ultimate futility of eye-for-an-eye politics and what, in the end, are immature responses to huge problems, usually of our own making. But the movie also acknowledges that this is who we are, this is what we do and even if it makes no sense, we often cannot help that we do it.
Ironies abound: a grandmotherly Golda Meir approving the revenge project and making tea for her chosen project leader while she sends him off on a quest that will destroy his soul; a mission that officially will never exist, yet that seeks to create a legend; Geoffrey Rush's self-effacing bureaucratic George Smiley persona calmly discussing the parameters of the mission while munching through a box of the Turkish sweet, baklava; the Israeli intelligence's insistence that the team produce bills if they want reimbursement of funds; the bumbling bomb-maker in the squad whose expertise is actually bomb disposal not bombing; the perfect family portrait of one of the intended victims, but that doesn't prevent him from being blown to bits; the amateur intelligence-gathering from the mercenary French underworld that lays the team open to being double-crossed and betrayed; the success of the mission that carries with it the seeds of its own failure.
A solid movie that stays with you a long, long time. 5 stars, a thumbs up and a potential DVD purchase.
Hyped: Brokeback Mountain, Ang Lee's tale of gay love in the mountains. In a word, B-o-ring. This movie has been hyped beyond belief and certainly beyond its slim capabilities. The buzz about this movie is the gay romance between two cowboys who discover deep love during a night of passion high in the mountains; a deep love that allegedly spans the next two decades while both of them get married, have children and lead otherwise heterosexual lives. I have a number of objections to this.
In the first place, they are not cowboys, they are sheep herders whose remit is to guard over a flock of sheep during the summer grazing months. The only cow who shows up in the movie has a 2-second cameo while hay is being dumped in her paddock. You can't be a cowboy without cows. Sheep somehow just don't cut it.
Secondly, the movie abounds in cars, pickup trucks and similar wheeled menaces. In the cowboy movies that I grew up watching, the only wheeled contrivances were the wagons that were circled at night to protect against marauding Indians (sorry, native Americans) and the stagecoaches that were robbed by bandits with bandanas around their faces. Something wrong, therefore, with the period of the movie.
Next, and this is critical: there is absolutely no chemistry between the leading pair. There is nothing in the story that explains why these two fall in love with each other so desperately. You might argue that love is blind and in the real world there is no reason why people fall in love with each other, but that is flimflammery. There are always reasons for love: they may not be logical reasons, but they are reasons none the less. And we're not talking about real life anyway, we're talking about the movies, which have a responsibility to tell a story and to involve the audience in that story. Watch African Queen and see the inexplicable attraction between Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn. Watch Casablanca and catch the smouldering sparks between Humphrey Bogart (again!) and Ingrid Bergman. Watch any Meg Ryan movie. Heck, even catch the normally wooden Tom Cruise with his delectable spouse (at the time, in real life too), Nicole Kidman in Eyes Wide Shut and you will see what I'm talking about when I say chemistry. Sorry, Jack and Ennis ain't got it.
Since I will now be accused of being homophobic, let me point to another gay themed movie that I consider a genuine classic: Midnight Cowboy. Enough said.
Finally, what was the story line of this unfortunate movie? Boy meets boy; they share a night of passion on a mountain top (passion, incidentally, that looks more like a bar-room brawl than gentle love - I somehow can't quite see Elton John and his beau behaving like that); they share some more days of bonding; they go their separate ways; they meet babes (Michelle Williams, by the way, is cute as a button!); they have babies; they keep meeting up over the years to rekindle their passion; one dies, the other doesn't. That's a story? Give me Hans Christan Andersen anyday.
My faith in the Oscars has been renewed after the resounding rejection of this movie at the awards. I do wonder though why Ang Lee got Best Director for this.
2 stars (for the wonderful locales), both thumbs down and I wouldn't keep this DVD if you paid me.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)