bhutan, land of happiness: what it means for the traveller

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[My below post was later published in the Gross National Happiness Centre June 2016 Newsletter.]

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I have a quiet smile playing on my lips. My eyes are content. This is through a daily dosage of countless hours on the road, wake up alarms by wee hour sunrises, and often dodgy plumbing and basic meals. I am in the land of happiness.

Whilst the rest of the world chases gross domestic and national products, the Kingdom of Bhutan has veered towards the road less trodden, in every sense. It chose happiness. And somewhere along the way, this translates to happiness for those who travel through it. This I assure you is no marketing spiel by PR or advertising honchos. It is for real. Continue reading →

cambodia: the sacred and ugly of divine rule

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[My below post first appeared as a travelogue in Hindustan Times, one of the largest newspapers in India, on 6 March, 2016 in both its print and online editions. The online edition can be read here]

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From Angkor Wat to the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge, Cambodia reveals that civilisations hold within them, both, the seeds of greatness and those of depravity

Continue reading →

why communication training for communicators?

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[My below post, posted under “personal musings” in this blog, first appeared as an Opinion Piece in Reputation Today, India’s first magazine for Public Relations and Communication professionals, on 20 February, 2016. The original article can be read here]

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Why Communication Training for Communicators?
So we can practice what we preach.

Oh, those endless press releases, speaking to journalists, coordinating events, generating online and print content, making sure the buzz is alive and kicking. As a communicator, much of our day is taken up communicating on behalf of our client or the company we work for.

The ultimate goal is that it is in the news for all the right reasons—seen, heard, respected and trusted. This is what ensures that positive appraisal come year-end, our aspired raise and reasons galore to preen.

Alas, life ain’t that simple. How often despite all our [best] endeavours, things go wrong, falling off the mark. That misunderstanding over a mail, the wasted hours barking up the wrong tree or should I say media house, or using tools and story hooks which our target audience just don’t connect with.

Every day, not in this case a good way, teaches us a lesson or two in communication. Why? Because we don’t practice, what we preach. Continue reading →

bhuleshwar bhulbhulaiya: lord shiva’s neighbourhood in mumbai

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Last Sunday I was invited to attend a test walk through Bhuleshwar curated by Khaki Tours. I had just returned to Bombay from a hectic trip to Delhi, and would have given anything to just sleep in. The only thing more tempting was the idea of this walk.

So come 6 am, I found myself wake up to the persistent alarm on my phone, and drag myself, accompanied with my camera to CP Tank, our meeting place. CP Tank, by the way, stands for Cowasjee Patel Tank. It used to be a water tank, built by Parsee philanthropist Cowasjee Patel in 1776, for supplying drinking water in Girgaon. Today, it is an island on VP Road. Dhirubhai Ambani and his family had a home in Bhuleshwar till the 1960s.

For the uninitiated, Bhuleshwar is a predominantly Gujarati neighbourhood just north of the Fort District. Try googling and there is very little you can, if truth be told, lay your hands on about it. Apart from a long list of shops, “Alice in Bhuleshwar” by Kaiwan Mehta and the claim that there are a hundred temples in the vicinity alone, try finding out more, and there is nothing.

Which makes sense, for the 100 temples mentioned are not tourist sites but places of worship for the locals over the past 150-odd years. They are part of their everyday life. Continue reading →

lal baug aka red garden—my love affair with bombay on valentine’s day

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It is Valentine’s Day and everyone and everything seems to be abuzz with how to celebrate a day devoted to love and affection with Mr. X or Mr. Z. My facebook wall suggests I spend it getting to know my adopted city a little better. After all, I love it, don’t I? The offered walk is through Lal Baug on Sunday morning, 14 February, 8:30 am.

I know nothing about the precinct mentioned in the marketing pitch. The name Lal Baug translates to red garden. Red for love. 🙂 Curious, I click on ‘going’.

Lal Baug, I soon discover is not one story but a tapestry of many, weaving into each other, much like a person if I may say so. It is more than a geographical area. It is a context, a community. Bombay or Mumbai or vice versa would be incomplete without Lal Baug. Let me explain. Continue reading →

so tell me, savita nair, what is ‘your real story’

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The written word can be a tantalizing, sacred concoction—a well-crafted, authentic collection of characters that throws insights into our world and sounds like music to our hearts. If one but knows, how to.

I chanced upon Savita Nair’s writings whilst surfing. It was just another day. I read one poem, and then another from her book 45ml. And I was hooked. I felt she was writing about me, unbarred, and bare. Somewhere along the way, we became fb friends. When I heard her second book Tell Me Your Real Story was just off the press I ran for the launch as expected. I was curious to know what made her tick. What made her read into everyone’s dark ugly closets and know exactly what we were all about. Was she some kind of psychic able to see through us plebs, stripping us of our masks!?

It was a lovely event. Some poetry reading, wine, a couple of celebrities to do the honours, and a vibrant Q&A. But no one asked her what was her real story. Why is the obvious so elusive at times.

So tell me, Savita Nair, what is your real story. The answers met me over a coffee one evening, earlier this week in Mahim. Continue reading →

art focus – i am a landscape painter – archana hande

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In respect to all, please know that these are historical photos, showing pictures, telling stories about those who are no longer with us.
I also acknowledge we are on Rann/ Forbidden Kingdom/ Wangai land; I take this opportunity to acknowledge all Elders, past and present.
Everyday everything goes back to the earth.

*The permission to narrate this story is given to me by the Family & Land.

~ Archana Hande

Archana Hande’s exhibition ‘I am a Landscape Painter’ is the story of Abdul Suthar, part true, part imagined. A Kutchch Muslim, Abdul leaves India, together with his camels, through the port of Kolkatta [Calcutta] for Australia. What he could have been, based on the choices that came his way, to where he eventually finds himself, deep in the 19th Century Goldfields trail, is recounted in Hande’s art through the landscapes he traversed. Continue reading →

babulnath mandir: south bombay’s ancient shiva temple

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Perched on a hillock in the heart of Bombay, behind a rather inconspicuous entrance is the 200-year-old Babulnath temple dedicated to Lord Shiva.

I hadn’t done much exploring in the city in the last couple of months (as you may have figured from my blog) and was antsy to start digging deeper again. Mention of the Babulnath temple cropped up whilst I was compiling an itinerary on ‘Mumbai in 48 hours’ for my sister’s very first time visit to Mumbai. I wanted to show her the touristy, as well as the local everyday sights. The temple, near Girgaum Chowpatty, I was told had to be in that list. Now was I going to wait till December to see it myself?? Haha. No ways! Continue reading →

art focus – rockscapes and mindscapes – vinod sharma

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“No, there is no story to my art. My work is not even titled.”

“But you call it rockscapes, and I have heard you at times refer to them as mindscapes?”

Vinod Sharma laughs out aloud, and with a twinkle in his eye explains how his professor at Delhi College of Art coined the terms, albeit in passing.

“I just paint for the sheer joy of it. There is no other reason behind my delineations. There are no moral lessons. No deep revelations from my side. It is only personal joy.”

Sharma, originally from Delhi, has been painting his monumental monochromatic canvases—sophisticated in execution and mystical in content—for over two decades now. What started off as landscapes framed by windows later gave way to sceneries swathed in trees and people, and finally morphed into the present skeletal forms of the earth’s surface where Sharma got rid of all trappings and borders, for keeps. Continue reading →

once upon a time, there was a fairy tale called buda-pest

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“Once upon a time I was young and beautiful. I flirted. I was brash. I was elegant. Time changed me. History scarred me. Will you love me still?”

Lying on the banks of the Danube, the twin cities of Buda and Pest are a bygone romantic fairytale draped in swaths of 60 years of communism, and at present the capital of a nation struggling to find its place in a capitalist world. Budapest demands and deserves delving beyond the obvious as one of Europe’s most popular holiday destinations and beautiful cities; if for no other reason than to just believe in fairy-tales again. Continue reading →