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warmth

On a cold winter night. Gurgaon, January 2012 . Damn it's already 2013. -0- Previously: In Summer

ek seekh kabab aur doosra Waheeda Rahman

"Do cheezon ke liye main banoo musalmaan. Ek seekh kabab aur doosra Waheeda Rahman" ~ Tom Alter in Kashmir -0-

Indian folk instruments

A few pages from ' The music of India by Herbert A. Popley '. Published 1921 by Oxford University Press. -0-

Daradiyo Na

from Basu Bhattacharya's Tumhara Kalloo (1975) A folk song used in a bunch of Hindi songs but right now online I could find only one: Shabbir kumar song Jawani Ki Rail Kahin from Coolie (1983). Can't recall others. As for the original, online the Chutney version is the closest one can get.
Ghungta Bricks. Noida. yeh toh hum bhi jaantay hai shehar kaisay bantay hai -0-

Princess Pazeb, 1902

The foot of a princess From 'India, by John L. Stoddard, illustrated and embellished' (1902) -0-

Learn to worry about the bomb

Recently finished reading a slim booklet  based on a series of lectures given in 1989 by K.R. Srinivasa Iyengar titled 'The Man of Letters and The Doomsday Clock'. The thing that I found interesting is that while the words from west presented on this subject had all kind of emotions like indignation, guilt and almost paranoidal fear, the only corresponding Indian voice on the subjects offered is that of Sri Aurobindo. And lines from his poem 'A Dream of Surreal Science' kind of sums his opinion on the subject: "Thus wagged on the surreal world till A scientist played with atoms and blew out The universe before God had time to shout" It seems that while writers in west people were almost loosing their mind thinking about the bomb, mystics in India were predicting doom that was in any case was foretold. While the influence of Aurobindo on Iyengar is known, still it all sounds dubious and all these words m...