Wanderink

The mountain Singhs

They lead us beyond yonder but seldom find their way into our acknowledgments or albums, status updates and shares. The best mountaineer is not one who climbs the highest mountain A couple of days in the jungle and I was good to snore my way through grunts and growls, squeals and shrieks. But this was […]

Like a flower from a bud / Amrutham, Trivandrum

Real rejuvenation first manifests as an acute happy somnolence. At Amrutham, a host of Ayurvedic massages and therapies by qualified practitioners take care of the first one; the location – surrounded by plush, green forest atop a hill – and aesthetically designed premises as per Vaastu caters to the second. When UK-based Sarah Cohen first […]

And it’s out: EXPERIENCE AGRA AND AROUND ON THE ROAD

Experiences and excerpts from ‘Experience Agra and Around On The Road’ written and photographed by me, published by the Times of India. Whoo-hoo… …I went. Red too seemed visibly buoyant as we swayed to the simoom that swept the NH2 and lurched from a sweltering Delhi towards a scorching Agra. August last year was not […]

Kerala bar ban: Listen to The Voice

I, like guys anywhere, have some of my fondest life-defining memories revolving around the bars in my hometown. In one I threw a bash after losing my virginity doling out the Marlboros she gave me which was also my first smoke, in another I celebrated a university rank, in yet another I drank to a […]

Not just another day: A photo feature on Fort Kochi

In an increasingly red-and-white world Fort Kochi is still green and blue. The same concession that thwarted all conquest still abounds. The Dutch and the Portuguese, the French and the Brits have all left, their latifundia considerably diminished and their illustrious pasts immured within cemeteries and churches. This estuarine land is fated to lose relevance […]

Itto…Irro: At the helm of the last rural bastion

All sporting events are tagged with a festive element that goes up with the rusticity of the setting. On the gaiety front – counting out the induced ones – few compare with the desert competitions of Rajasthan or the traditional water games of Goa. The snakeboat race of Kerala takes it up by another notch […]

She is pretty and she knows it

The bunds that hold back the lake water from overrunning adjoining paddy fields glisten in trepidation. Rain trees canopies a calm that quivers in anticipation. Palm fronds hold their breath. The usually gregarious marsh toads fall uncannily silent, eyes wide and unblinking, lethal tongues sheathed. The cormorant makes several desperate swoops into the water only […]

The journey called Indian Railways

Book review: India Junction – A Window to the Nation (An edited version of the review appeared in the Sunday Express dated July 20, 2014) This may not exactly be the most opportune time for a book on the Indian Railways, by the Indian Railways, what with the political and passenger angst around the recent fare hike. […]

Aboard the Duronto to Iraq. And back.

He was occupying my seat – number 33 – when I boarded the Duronto Express from Hazrat Nizamuddin to Ernakulam on July 5. “The terrorists were nice?” He asked incredulously into the phone in Malayalam. Now my assigned seat was a window – a good fortune which interminably brightened up my journeys – and I […]