“Happiness writes in white ink on a white page.” The French writer Henry de Montherlant said it; these days, the words have been spilling from Salman Rushdie’s lips as he makes the rounds talking about his new memoir, “Knife: Mediations After an Attempted Murder.” I just started reading the book in which, as the title suggests, …
I edited a story this week about a woman who found rebirth through a pregnancy during the pandemic. I tried hard to understand how she felt and yet, the concepts of motherhood were so alien to me. I have never been a mother. I will never be one. I had a mother once. I will …
I have always been called the oldest among my cousins because the truly eldest of my generation were so much older than the rest of us, the sons of my eldest aunt, that they were not a part of our childhood gang. It was almost as though Gonuda and Manuda should have been our kakas …
I grew up in a Kolkata that is vastly different than the one today. My childhood memories are not of afternoons spent in South City’s sprawling food court eating burgers or watching movies in IMAX theaters.
In my youth, Kolkata fell frequently into darkness during incessant power cuts and my brother and I grew desperate to escape the thick, hot air of my grandfather’s house. We played cricket on the streets and ate phuchka at the New Alipur park. I saw the movie “Yaadon ki Baaraat” at least a dozen times just to get out of the sun, sit under a fan and listen to my favorite Bollywood song, “Chura Liya Hai Tumne.” That was the only way to hear it unless a neighborhood paan and bidi stall decided to blast it with a mic.
Adda was a thing. I mean, really a thing, and we often accompanied Ma on evening jaunts to visit friends and relatives. I lived through food rations and water shortages. I hung from crowded buses hoping my slip-on shoes would not slip off. Back then, only the uber-wealthy owned cars. My father never did; not on his professorial salary at the Indian Statistical Institute.
Life seemed hard compared to the modern conveniences of what middle class Kolkatans have now. We had little in the way of consumer goods or comfort. We slept on hard beds and without air-conditioning, we awoke drenched every morning, our pores opened wide and cleaned by air wetter than a damp towel. I dreamed of a day when we would no longer have to beg my uncle, then a merchant marine, to bring us back Kit-Kats from his adventures overseas. Or when I wouldn’t have to think of creative ways to stretch the waistline on the one pair of jeans I had left, as though I could defy childhood growth.
Continue readingMemories of Durga Pujo and a very different Kolkata
Today, on the 70th birthday of my homeland, I reread Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s evocative speech, delivered just before India gained independence from oppressive British rule. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when …
Continue reading “Freedom at midnight: Indian independence came at a high cost”
He was known in my native India as the hero of the Bangladesh war. In Israel, he was known as the highest-ranking Jew in the Indian Army. Lieutenant General Farj Rafael Jacob died Wednesday morning. He was 92. Jacob said in interviews that he was drawn to the then-British Indian Army in 1942 because of the …
Pope Francis announced that Mother Teresa is becoming a saint. She will be canonized next fall. The pontiff attributed the miraculous healing of a Brazilian man with multiple brain tumors, which means the Albanian-born nun can now ascend to the most vaulted status in the Catholic church. But for me, and millions in my hometown …
Today we mark a day of solemnity, remembering all those who fought for our country. I salute you on Veterans Day, especially those of you I came to know well in Iraq. I think of you often, not just on days reserved to honor you. Today is also a day of joy. It’s the festival …
Continue reading “Diwali, Lakshmi and good winning over evil”
A few weeks ago, I went to see “3 1/2 Minutes, Ten Bullets,” a riveting documentary about the shooting death of Jordan Davis at a Jacksonville gas station. It’s well worth your time. On the way out, I picked up a Midtown Art film calendar that had Apu’s face on the cover. Apu as …
The film “Aradhana” had just made its big splash in 1969 when my family returned once again from a soujourn in America to India. As we settled back to a middle-class existence that back then meant ration cards and standing in line for water, the songs of “Aradhana” blared on speakers at street stalls. We …
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