Notes from the diary of an Indian in England
Positano is a town best enjoyed with a thick wad of cash, a healthy pair of lungs, and excellent knees.
In the Kerala of my childhood, before my people succumbed to the invasion of ‘cafes’, ‘restaurants’ and ‘bistros’ selling everything from bel puri to kebabs to malayalified Chinese, we of the old ate at chayakkadas (tea shops).
A guy I know well at work has been selling Norway to me for years. Our conversations often go like this.
I had never thought deeply about pork knuckles before I arrived in Prague. I never had to. Do pigs have knuckles? Golly. Do they punch each other?
Anyone who has ever passed through an airport anywhere in the world has witnessed the swagger of the pilots and the sashay of the stewardesses.
Wet with the bucket of cold water he half-willingly poured on himself, he stands by the body of his father, palms together, naked to the waist, head bowed to the prayers of the priest with a piety he does not feel.
I believe they are wonderful creations of God, made solely for the purpose of teaching big airports a thing or two about how airports are meant to be.
There were 20 of them at the Little Chef for New Year’s lunch. Outside, it poured. Inside, under the electric mist that hung from red lampshades, it was warm, the red tabletops smooth and shining.
The girl was cute, the guy, not. They sat by the door, at a table for two, and talked non-stop.
And I travelled 4,000 miles, over land and sea and river and forest to the land of my birth, the land blessed by the Virile Yogi, the brahmachari, the karmachari.