While I munch currencies of expired beaten rice, let met tell you there is a lost generation of South Indians who do not speak 35 pure and deep indigenous languages and dialects. There is also a subset of that lost gen that happens to be direly dyslexic and so incapable of learning any of those tongues even after ardent and prolonged exposure. So a standing joke between my sis and I (who has now left me behind by showing after marriage she knew malayalam all long; latent) since college days, was our earnest translation of the Tamil Hit song: 'Chinne Chinne Assae'. Guess what our take was? Here goes: 'Tiny Tiny Ass'.
But the best part has to be that I am learning from scratch.
scritch scritch.

The Supremes

Not to get lachry-nostalgic, but hearing about The Supremes made me think that us 3 siss should get together some day and give a performance surpassing even those of old times.

Let this not take away from the person and work of Vaikom Muhammad Basheer

The Perch production was alright. Actors with their urban confidence and awareness. A mediocre production and the joke of a standing ovation which began when one clapper wanted to stretch his legs. I was suspect too. What was the point of putting up a little show of resistance, so we stood up and clapped and blushed a bit at our own show while the performers linked hands, touched their several toes and looked up touching their respective hearts at intervals; a few seconds into the awkwardsness I think it became fairly obvious to them what the case was. I am very clear what I appreciate is the absolute selection of Basheer for a production; not so much the delicate distracting Aparna Gopinath as Basheer himself. No mistakes about that.

[Written yesterday: I'm fairly zimmed since ages after protective company in old dens after a venerable malayalam english play and everyone saying byebye and how we must fix for a parting trek in 2 weeks, I am fairly marooned and in need of not engineered privation but fixed meditation - unthrown. I will miss insights and D's one on geniune people she introduced me to but whom she felt unworthy of, whom I already knew were 'true'. You know who they are no? The kind of smile that invests everything and dies right in you, some fragility that kissed you on the cheek and did not want to leave you.]

In the adaptation, I suspect the plainess has gone missing with the urbane tics/antics of the actors except most definitely the one who played the part of Basheer - a composed, even and perfectly-cast Paul Mathew (ex-Captain). All in all, I need a break from stories of men and their outlook.

Tum brum allergy or What goes round or One ick deserves an ack

"The daily rituals in Kerala temples are traditionally performed by Namboothiris, and often by Embranthiri migrants from the neighbouring Karnataka, but not by Tamil Brahmins...
...in the past Nambudiris considered themselves polluted by even the touch of other Brahmins: Eda Shudha touch of Tamil Brahmins such as Iyer, Iyengar, Pattar which required the Nambudiri to bathe before resuming activities)..." - Wikip

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences

D getting married. awww. What can I say? Congrats.

At long last, i can announce my fully amicable divorce from 'writer' jobs and yes a nevermore to the top spin world of somebody else's advertising. For this I have to thank the meeting I had with a pretty smart mallu head of a beat 4-letter big agency of my picking. Walking in as a dyedinthestool socialist (as I had) in a thin kurta with underarm sweat moons reaching to the waist - is like asking for it. But I had a perfect exchange with the gun who pointed to exactly what it was I was trying to hint at: no more jobwriting for me please; i'm into people and talking to them and always have been. So 'suit' obviously. And now the ball's in my court and I hit it not only beyond the stands but outside the stadium, and I walk into exit all smiles at making my peace.

**** My special thanks to D (who doesn't read blogs) for just being there in a tricky patch. I'm not one to believe in the friendship biz. which is mostly about public show and pledged to sex arrangements; we're frigid, distant, emotionally-impaired planks with separate agendas, but she was there when I needed an ear, and that counts for something better.

Kiss kiss fuck fuck

Astounding

The bunch of photo-op-seeking Indian Yinglish writers are balls. Because O V Vijayan came before them and quietly wrote 'Legends of Khasak' and went on with work; no keeness, smiles or special angles for a lover behind the camera. I'm glad I didn't die before reading it. Astounding. Read it and then remind yourself - he wrote this in Malayalam and then did the glish translation himself. This is not about false pride in flaunting the vernacular like U R Ananthamurthy proved to a friend yesterday, this is about being humble enough to notice, hear and understand everything: people from outside places even brilliance beyond language.

Tee-hee. titter. Goldfinch braves snow.

BBC: William Wells' photo of a goldfinch in Oxfordshire.

Let's forgive this guy for living in Delhi and then blogging about it like anyone should care. He opines like a non-Delhiite though from his name you couldnt tell which part of the grand land he's from (which is at it should be). Mayank Austen Soofi must have parents, or atleast one, more enlightened than many to give him that name. But to get to his ogging: I remember objecting to one of his posts; his writing is excruciatingly underformed when not superbly rescued by his caption-spiked photos. Readers, readers - take a look at his Delhi photos; they express better. Just take a look at them. Excellent. As with other good documentary photographers, the point is: their hearts in the right place. Then they're building a body of work. It's the kind of journey that's worth watching.
other news 1, Can someone assist me in moving out once and for all from Bangalore? My spine is slowly filling with dead lead.
other news 2, Trolley talk - mixedrace identity ; Adwoa-Shanti Dickson
other news 3, And what's with not announcing Frederick Dove's removal as presenter of Outlook on the BB World Service? Few weeks back, I just happened to catch his swansong and the sadness in his voice saying it was his last show. And that's the last thing he says. Nobody like that should leave without an elegy.

miasmic

This left me very strange. Yesterday night i had harmless but affecting overlapping dreams as if they were happening again from the exact past with some inventions. My first acquaintances - who used to come home and whose families I would move with shamelessly - were back and visiting me like before with some boys i was a little anxious about on behalf of neighbours. Parents had just left and party had just arrived and the place was bright and done up fine. Just as the party stepped in, I had to step out (along with a very longstanding friend) for a quick visit to a kind of old city club - a very run-down small sort of bowring. This club which was a kind of wooden pub was frozen in time - with a few old civil service men and attitudes. dusty tables and worn wood panelling. Somewhere reached through a bylane of Shivajinagar - and there they all sat, not many, moving slowly and waiting for some old man or another. A family came in - Armykind with Southern class, strong wife, and wellsettled adolescent son more like a friend of his father. I was only moving about. Back to the first frame when the friends were at the gate, *issa for some reason had pinched my cheek and looked sympathetic which as always made me feel arrogant because she had no idea. Things moved on - no conclusions, just miasmic.
***
I had no opinions about this treat of a sequence, I was just on an errand but I was so disembodied and in very odd way alienated by the whole tapestry.
So today at desk, I'm feeling a bit shifted, displaced, mislaigned...
***
another feature piece in the miasm was that the fridge door closing mechanism was impeded for good. So what? i slam it a lot in real life big deal who wants a fridge.

materialicious

Another thing and featured above page 2: Acrylic One Composite Solutions: material is a solvent-free, water-based resin It is used to mimic all kinds of materials - wood, concrete, metal, slate. Criticism would be brought on by large-scale production.
In other news: Not only is Baichung Bhutia one of the few Indian sportsmen in the right sport, he also happens to be one of the few with any balls.