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A different feeling
Six years ago, one of my first posts on this blog was about the feelings of being behind a glass, and seeing the world outside. http://againstabsolutes.com/2006/05/06/glass/ Strange how this enveloping can become something your soul starts needing. Early mornings at BBH are so addictive. A short trip from home, a quick trot up two floors, push […]
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To my fellow Millenials
Eddie Vedder on the cover of Time, 1993. He never wanted to be on the article and hated the magazine for putting him on its cover. Amongst the pleasant sadness and acoustic happiness of Indie, do you remember the anger and pain that Pearl Jam and Nirvana captured for us? That we held so very […]
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Reflections on the accident of birth
My mother pointed me to a recent article in The Hindu about a study done on the nature of domestic help. And it got me thinking about some things that had lain buried for a while. I have had an extremely privileged upbringing. I was the eldest born of my generation, a boy with all his digits […]
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Pillow + Scream
Lifebood, All entwined. Pinpricks of tears, Hit out From a shared subconcious, How I hate this ageing, How I hate this dying, How I hate this finiteness of everything, Every place, Every world, Every emotion, every tear. Why are we so fragile, When we think we are Gods.
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Electric Impulses
In the spaces between words, In the silence surrounding voices, In the spaces outside the letters Lies that which is more precious, Than anything we can define, Or defile with measurement. The vector of Time spares no one, Slashes and surges through these Veins of nothingness Leaving dust in our hands, Shadows in our minds, […]
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After 10 years
There is something Mumbai has against wall paint. There is something we like about the concept of letting layer upon layer of grime, fungus and disease accumulate on the walls of our homes, offices, shops and establishments. We always hear about Indian streets and stairwells. How both are lined first with dirt, and then with […]
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All at the same time
Black coffee and Glenlivet, Fine cotton and leather, Warm blankets, new tablet, Soft skin, new hearth, Old bombs, old refugee tents, New dictators, old ways, Old terrors, new tech, Old borders, new guns, Cold hearts, warm blood, Cold streets, warm hearts. All at the same time.
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The Biggest Problem with the Gaming Industry (amongst others)
Let me begin with a parallel. Ms. Rowling wrote 7 Harry Potter books. Their popularity made her one of the richest people in the UK. But that’s the aside. The real story is how she made a mockery of every pundit predicting that the age for children and adults consuming printed books and literature is […]
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The Lament Of History
I had always read of how History was full of Laments. The most powerful stories of mythology have been laments. Of Cities, Kings, Peoples, and Prophets. We middle class Indian boys are never brought up to dream of being one with such things except through the most ancient of ways: that of storytelling – reading […]
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Not another Kolkata ode.
In this country, it is so easy to idealise the past and our agrarian roots. I grew up with this rhetoric, being a Bengali. Of the greatness of Tagore, of the days of the Bengali freedom struggle, of the days when the bhadralok learned English and became a barrister, but also wore the dhuti, ate […]