Fire-Frying Pan Situation

We were in Pune last week for a family reunion & our visit coincided with Modi's big rally at Pune's BJ Medical college. The media was full of coverage of the Modi rally & while everyone knows which newspaper/ news channel is aligned to which wing, the public debates made for some interesting reading/ viewing. 

I'm not a Modi fan. He's too right-winged to be a leader of my choice. But I'm not a  Congress fan either & I have no doubt that the country would run into economic catastrophe under the Gandhi leadership; that the money earmarked under the Food Security Bill will never make it to the poor & there is a multi-crore corruption case around every corner. And this is precisely the reason why Modi has caught the fancy of the nation's urban young. He may not be aligned to the spirit that is the building block of the country, but is there really anyone else, anyone at all, who's likely to change the economic reality of urban India? It's hard to say what really is the biggest crisis in India today - the economic or the social. And its therefore difficult to say whether its more pressing to depose someone from power who is unscrupulous in one area rather than the other.

Most young Indians I know are clearly convinced by one over the other. I don't understand how. 

The Garlic Ballads by Mo Yan

After Mo Yan won the Nobel prize, his books started getting displayed prominently in bookstores in Singapore & I almost picked up a copy. But then my friend S had one too & I borrowed it from her roughly 3 months ago. And I finally finished it last night. 

It's meant to be a hard-hitting, covered-in-reality-poverty-&-brutality sorta depiction of China in the 80s. Having said that how many pages can one read of poor peasants getting tortured by authorities or a young girl in love getting hammered by her family? There was a complete lack of humor or respite from the constant pitiful reality & I can't say the book made me feel much other than disgust beyond a point. I come from India & I get the psyche of honor killings. I also get the day to day callousness towards human life for those who live in abject poverty. I also understand the author's need to strip naked the ugly face of the Chinese political & social truth. But for me, it didn't make for a good read. The story needed some shreds of happiness or normalcy in the lives of its characters for the reader to feel something for them.  

4 going on 14

After watching all the news about the new royal baby, 4-year old K asked me today, "Why does England have a king instead of a government?"!!!

Seriously, how fast do kids grow up these days? 

Cardbot

Saw this robot sculpture made out of recycled cardboard at the National Library last evening. Pretty cool isn't it!

An evening at an unknown island

I had never swum in the ocean before. I have always had a fear of the ocean waters & the farthest I would go was until my feet still touched the ocean bed. That changed last weekend though.

A new fear conquered :)