Tid Bit from My Diary

The school that my daughter attends for music decided to participate in the annual day celebrations of a school for children with special needs . When it was their turn, they got to the stage and stood shoulder to shoulder with the choir group of the celebrating school. Together they presented the popular song, “ What a wonderful world” by Louis Armstrong. I felt it was quite an intense and emotional experience for all the participants as well as their parents. As they sang together “I see trees of green, red roses too I see them bloom for me and you And I think to myself what a wonderful world……” it was a defining experience for those kids who had little idea about the challenges associated with the term “ special needs ”. But this is not the subject of this post. In preparation of the program, the teacher in charge had formed a group in the “WhatsApp”. She coordinated with the parent of this small group of voluntary participants letting us know about the time to drop-...

Let's start this topic with a quote from Jane Austen. “ There is nothing I would not do for those who are really my friends. ” she said and argued “ I have no notion of loving people by halves, it is not my nature. ” That's probably how most of us as Indians feel about our culture except a few who thinks differently. I have been living outside the country for more than two decades and have met many people who has left the country temporarily or permanently who echoes the same sentiment. One thing that unites us all is the our culture no matter how diverse we are in our thoughts, beliefs, language or appearance. Yes we are still culturally diverse although many of our festivals and values are now intertwined across the subcultures.  But retaining this trait for a country of India's complexity and volume withstanding resistance from people who quite often spew venom in the social media is quite an commendable achievement. I once listened to an interview and one stat...

Finally I looked up for its literal meaning in the Wikipedia. I believe it was a subconscious instruction to my fingers to confirm what my mind had been suspecting for some time now. Writer's block is a condition, primarily associated with writing, in which an author loses the ability to produce new work, or experiences a creative slowdown. The condition ranges in difficulty from coming up with original ideas to being unable to produce a work for years. Throughout history, writer's block has been a documented problem.   As if finding a subject was not difficult enough that my mind also insists on justifying that with reasons before it would let me get going with my writing task.  This makes maintaining a blog even more challenging.  I am sure, I am not the only one who feels this way and envy those who keeps churning post after posts day after day. There was a time when one used to approach the proverbial wise-man, who could easily been a woman too, for support a...

Your great grandchild will be surprised to know that you had physically transported yourself to tourist destinations. It will be shocking for them to accept the fact that people took such extraordinary efforts for mundane experience of a jungle safari or a walk on the Great Wall of China. An experience which could easily be enjoyed during a lunch break. If it is not yours, his grandchild will most certainly be looking at us as though we were the hunters’ gatherers of the twenty-first century.   It’s not a daymare, it’s just a dream! Virtual Reality is making inroads into the life of the proverbial common man at a speed much faster than what we would be comfortable to accept. Any major, important or popular tourist destination has already been digitized in their minutest of details. We can easily experience a fly over the highest peak of the largest mountain or inspect the intricate details of St Paul’s Cathedral leaning back on our desk chair. Today, it may analogous to ga...

Marc Quinn is a British contemporary visual artist of a very high repute and caliber. His repertoire include sculptures, paintings and installations. We were fortunate to be able to stand in front of his sculpture called ”The Conservation of Mass” and admire as it was displayed in the grounds of the Museum of Islamic Arts (MIA) Doha. This majestic looking 2015 stainless steel piece is of dimensions 263h X 750w x 192d cm was part of his first solo exhibition in the region. Varshika had made a brief video presentation of this sculpture in her own way during our visit. This is part of Quinn’s wider body of works titled “Frozen Waves” characterized by minimal arches, gestural shapes and stainless steel construction. The artist cautions that these are not sculptures of waves but an unwitting self-portrait by nature. These has been inspired by the brute authority of nature that constantly enforces the “dust to dust” existence of all living creatures. Each piece ar...

YouGov.uk has recently released their survey result for world’s most admired individual 2018. The most admired man turned out to be Mr. Bill Gates, while Ms. Angelina Jolie came out as the most admired woman. Both are well revered for their philanthropic efforts, no one would dare question Gates’ contribution to proliferation of the personal computers. Bill and Melinda Gates’ foundation is also doing a lot for the underprivileged children and medical research among other. Barak and Michelle Obamas were both placed in second position in their respective categories. It’s understandable that the selection is heavily reliant on computer literacy and internet accessibility among the voting population. When it comes to the internet users in terms of pure numbers, India is in the same league with the USA and China. This is quite obvious from the names that popped up in the first twenty for both genders. Even after discounting the much maligned AI and manipulative analytics, it’s har...

Did you ever wish to be in a place where you would open a cabinet and take any book if you fancy and return it at another time after you are done with it. Or for that matter place one of your own books that you have finished reading for another book lover to enjoy. No questions asked, no string attached and unmanned. There is one such place that I know. Its the Katara cultural village in Doha, Qatar. There are quite a few shelf like these for used books that would promote the habit of reading.