we are like this only

Just read an article in the latest Economist that made me see red. In the edit piece about Egypt's revolution and how the West mustn't fear the consequences thereafter, since even the Muslim Brotherhood is unlikely to be able to carry out its more fundamentalist agenda since they will need to go through a democratic process and enjoy only about 20% popularity, it ends by saying that the West can't now fear the aftermath of Egypt espousing 'Western' values like freedom and self-determination. Hello, are we speaking about the same West that colonized much of the world until recently and refused to get out until they were booted out? The same West that props up dictatorships world over from Saudi Arabia and Egypt to Latin America, for reasons that have more to do with economic or political expdiency and less to d with principle? The same West whose President once famously stated about a dictator that "he may be a son of a bitch but he's our son of a bitch...

A and I finally managed to get to the Anish Kapoor exhibit at NGMA before it got over. I had seen one piece by the artist ath the 2009 Art Summit in Delhi, and of course photographs of his work have been appearing for a while now, but I didn't really know what to expect. I was very curious, because I had heard rave reviews from Mumbai and yet Manjula Padmanabhan's review said that it was almost frighteningly isolationist in terms of dwarfing human experience with scale - art without heart. As for the exhibit itself, most of the pieces here are models of work that is installed or in progress elsewhere, so in that sense, while one gets an idea of what he is doing, one doesn't get the full experience. There were one or two smaller pieces though, and the one that got A and me hooked was titled triangle mirror. It was a rough circle, composed of hundreds of triangularly shaped mirrors, about 2 inches a side, pieced together like a stained glass piece. And it was magical. It drew...

They are really getting many of my goats - maybe to make mutton biryani out of them!!! So...we thought it'd be nice if we could go watch one of the sporting events with the kids. Yesterday afternoon, I tried the official CWG site, hoping to be able to book some tickets online, snce, as you know, India is an IT superpower. So I go through the entire process, log in, pick the event ( gymnastics), am all ready with credit card in hand, when the site says, "We are handling the maximum number of customers right now. Please try after some time." Okay, so some of those stadia seats will now have bums that paid for the privilege of sitting there. I wait half an hour, then try again. same result as above. I wait another hour, then try again...have you ever heard the definition of insanity? That thing about trying the same thing again and again and expecting different results? So in the afternoon, a friend and I trek to the one mall in Gurgaon that has a live kiosk, manned by some ...

For any of you who are my friends on facebook, you may have noticed my less than enthusiastic updates on the commonwealth games, otherwise known as CWG. So...here's why they are getting my goat: First of all, aren't we, as a country, a little too poor to afford such exhibitions of chauvinism and ego? Yes, I know it's the world's 11th largest economy and growing at the second fastest rate. But the GDP per capita is still $ 1000, barely Rs. 45,000 per year. 850 million Indians are below the poverty line. The money is far better spent on doing something useful to make them part of the India that is shining, rather than on buying a little more spit and polish for shining India. It's the equivalent of me spendingmy money buying my son books rather than on hosting his birthday party at a five-star venue. One is going to have a long term benefit, the other is momentary, for the sake of impressing other people and soon to be forgotten. Secondly, if at all you insist on hold...

Roohi came into our lives in 1995, by accident or happenstance. Our servant had adopted her from someone, as he had always wanted a dog. She was just a little puppy when she came, about a month or two old, a small ball of fur. The name Roohi suited her, because she looked like a piece of cottonwool. It was later that we realized that the other meaning of Roohi, soulful, was also apt. Roohi soon made friends with us, as she gambolled through the extensive lawns of our home, and we grew to love the frisky little thing, eager for everyone's affection and so playful. My sister, always an animal lover, famous for having wanted to adopt a 2 day old kitten when she was a little girl of 8, was in love with her, since she had always wanted pets. A neighbour's Spitz, Pepsi, also became a frequent visitor to our house, as his owners used to be away most of the time and the servants used to illtreat the poor guy very badly, beating him and starving him. He used to crave affection and had a...

26 th June 2010 Mr. Martin Pieters, CEO, Vodafone Essar Peninsula Corporate Park Ganpatrao Kadam Marg Lower Parel Mumbai - 400013 India Dear Mr. Pieters, Re: Terminating Vodafone connection due to terrible service I realize that one customer terminating the services of your brand may not be very important for a company as large as yours. However, it may still interest you (in case the company is at all interested in actually providing service rather than grief to its customers), to understand why I am terminating a 14 year old relationship with Essar/ Hutch/ Vodafone. I had written to you in May regarding the problem I was facing. While that elicited an immediate response, for which I thank you, of having my phone connectivity restored, I still did not receive the bill until much after the due date, and then only after I requested for duplicate copies of the same. I was therefore forced to make a blind payment this month, without seeing the detailed bill, which I am sure you would ag...

…Why I am banging my head on a stone wall hoping to numb brain activity so as to make sense of this! I was away in the US visiting my sister when I got a message from Vodafone that my mobile usage had exceeded my credit limit and that I should immediately pay up a certain amount. I forwarded the message to A who paid up immediately. The day after that payment, I got another message saying that twice the earlier amount was outstanding and that I should pay up immediately. By that time I was in the middle of a mess caused by the volcano, busy rerouting my flight and making hotel bookings and so on for the return trip, so this was the last thing on my mind. Plus as it happened, after I got that message, my phone stopped receiving any network signals so I couldn’t make calls or send any messages from it. I landed back last Thursday and at the airport when I tried to call A, I got a message saying that calls were disbarred. I told A but what with the extreme exhaustion after havin...