The Blog

Home > The Blog

Tampopo

There is a mom-and-pop Japanese eatery in the food court of a mall near me. Pop cooks the food; mom takes orders and serves the food. Mom never smiles. She speaks to customers mostly to tell them not to poke the onigiri -- or merely...

Pey Nayanar

On a dark night, the poet Karaikaal Ammaiyar—believed to have lived in the sixth century A.D.—made her way to the cremation ground, a space shunned then as now, to witness Lord Shiva dance. Her impressions crystallized into two ten-verse poems known as the “Patikams from...

Meenakshi and The Supernumerary Nipple

Legend says that the Pandya king, the ruler of Madurai, rejoiced at the birth of his daughter. She had beautiful eyes, like a pair of chiral fish. So she became Meenakshi, which is Sanskrit for “fish-eye”. The royal child had another physical characteristic, which the...

Veet — A Brick

And the conversation drifted to sons who don't take as good care of their ageing parents as they should. The blame shifts to the daughter-in-law. The son gets off the hook -- old story. Which reminds me of the "sthalapurana" or origin story of the...

A Writer Meets His Idol

At the age of 14, Dilip Kumar had become a wage earner for the family. They were members of a mercantile community from Gujarat. These immigrants to Tamil Nadu lived in Coimbatore and Chennai, the state's capital. The death of this father slammed the doors...

From Controversy to Cure

Inside the Cambridge Biotech Boom In the summer of 1977, a contentious debate about genetic engineering erupted in the city of Cambridge, pitting scientist against scientist and citizen against citizen. An unlikely mix of science and engineering, politics, the space race, and urban renewal transformed...