I thought he must have been very close to the person who had died to feel such terrible distress. He replied in a low hoarse voice that indeed he had known and loved that person very much. His face reflected his torment.

...I laugh as I think of them, these women who once prided themselves on their houses, their jewellery, and their saris. Women who looked down their noses at me.

Almost to a man everyone in Juba is anxious to see the 9th of July through. Even the recent capture of Abeyi, an oil producing province, by Khartoum, is not being taken as provocation. full article

But once you went under the shadows of the overbearing teaks the number became insignificant in the immensity of the plains. You lost sense of direction. The deep forest absorbed everything, even silence.

With full-throated fervour they would sing one Beatles track after another, but always find their way back to, “You say Yes, I say No.” They could never hit a tune, but were perfectly synchronised.

He was not one of those people whom you could call friendly. There was an air about him that said, ‘will speak only when spoken to’. It was not that he disliked people.

"When you break from native tradition, you lose the knowledge and distance yourself from the nature in the region. That will disrupt your lifestyle and tear the fabric of culture apart."

"...You would challenge Nature’s will? The mother cat has orphaned it."

This time I was in Thailand, aptly called the ‘Land of Smiles’. Thailand for me always remains a special place - one with amazing history and culture, superb cuisine and warm friendships.

And the most important thing that makes us human is that we are unique, each of us. That’s the first thing that strikes you when you embark upon a Kurt Wallander adventure - that he is set in a different mould. But what is it that sets him apart?

If there’s one thing you don’t see in a pub in Bangalore, it’s a dog. Now in London, pub owners don’t mind dogs at all and even actively encourage customers to bring in their canine companions. Sometimes, this has mixed results...

...I was excited.  I would be able to meet up with an old friend Zuenkosan who, many years ago, studied Tagore in the Shantiniketan University.  She used to amaze me with Bengali haiku sung in the style of Rabindrasangeet.

Simultala Conservationists, a not-for-profit organisation, runs from a nondescript house in Simultala, a village in the Hooghly district of West Bengal (some 40km from Kolkata).

She blushed and he blamed himself for his eyebrow. He ought to put her at ease and instead his quirky, teasing eyebrow was making her feel embarrassed.

It was a new identity. I had heard of June or Judith but a noun like happiness was like having saltless food, something that needed a familiarity or getting used to.

There was no mistaking the biscuit-coloured vest; the white shirt; the balding, oiled hair; the jutting chin; the round face; the long, crooked nose; the bent ears. Aman Fernandes had seen that face and that body a thousand times in his life...

G H Hardy, that great English mathematician has said that mathematicians, especially those in the field of Number Theory are not of much use to the world.

Some of My Favourite Things ~ Pali Tripathi
Crumbs made of sunset, sand and silence
Watery imprints giving way to stubborn fury...