The Caterpillar Café

Guest Post | 30 Days of Night by Aditi Mittal

2012-02-27T00:32:00.002+05:30

30 Days of Night is brutal. No seriously, simply opening the cover of the book will land you a roundhouse kick to the face and a punch in the stomach. I want to call it the Chuck Norris of Vampire graphic novels but that would be doing Vampires a serious disservice.

Steve Niles’ comic book series starts with the titular 30 Days of Night. Set in the windswept Barrow, the northernmost town of Alaska where the sun does not rise for 30 days, it details the survival of the town people against a horde of vampires.

Somewhere in their journey from 1922′s Nosferatu, vampires went from bone-chilling creatures to teenage brooding angst (or angsty brood-yness, depending on the day) that has inspired the irritating “He He He, it Twinkles” tagline. I’m surprised Tribhovandas Bhimji Zaveri or DeBeers has not signed on Edward Cullen as an ambassador yet. Diamonds and vampires are forever after all.

But the vampires that descend on Barrow the moment the sun sets are merciless and relentless. Armed with a mouth full of shark-like teeth, black eyes and super-human powers, they know only one thing- hunger. Today they live among us, an unusually reticent neighbor, the nasty night shift manager at the 7/11. “Do you know,” as one of the vampires asks “, how many years it has taken us to convince humans that we are a myth?”

Ben Templesmith’s art work, based in water and pencil supplements the dizzying pace of the story, pages and pages of blood spattered snow and decapitated heads, it seems like he keeps daring the reader to turn to the next page. And turn we do, becasue along with the rich world of the vampires, he also creates an equally complete world of human characters that keeps us rooted in reality.

Eben and Stella Olemaun are the sheriff-couple of Barrow that manage to survive the 30 days of darkness. The speed, poetry and cruelty with which characters are introduced and destroyed (within panels sometimes), makes you lament the transience of the reality that Templesmith and Niles have created. We are reminded that the war of human vs. vampires shall be rife with casualties. At the end of the book, I found myself desperately looking for plot holes, trying to reconcile the fact that it’s just a comic book and I didn’t need to panic. There were some minor ones no doubt, but nothing glaring enough to take you away from the narrative of the story.

The second installment of the series labelled “Dark Days” follows Stella Olemaun as she tours L.A, trying to convince the world of theexistence of vampires. The female protagonist and antagonist add a psychological and emotional element to the story that’s normally missing in bad-ass, punch-to-the-face, get-up-inspite-of-being-shot-in-the-chest-10-times kind of hero.

The unnerving calm hides a conflicted woman trying to come to terms with her loss and desire for revenge. It’s this quality that makes the story so unpredictable, because the pivot is not situational, but emotional. The line between humans and vampires blurs as she makes her way deeper into their world.

The third installment “Return to Barrow” takes us back to the scene of the original massacre. I’m ready with my truck full of ammo to take a wild ride on this one!

Aditi Mittal is this cool person who spends a lot of time getting paid to stand in front of people and not tell knock-knock jokes. We're super kicked that she let us ~~rip this post off~~ ~~copy-paste~~ publish this review of 30 Days of Night on The Caterpillar Cafe. You should read some of her other stuff on her personal blog that doesn't look big in this. You can also Follow her on Twitter and 'Like' her on Facebook.

Coffee, Tea and the Millennium Trilogy

2012-02-24T12:31:00.001+05:30

Sweden drinks too much coffee, I've deciphered from Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy.

“Hello there! I need to ask you some important questions.”

“Coffee?”

“Please.”

“Hello there! Let’s sit in this conference room until we come up with a concrete plan to crack this conspiracy wide open. It could take 8-12 hours. Let’s not worry about food or anything but…”

“Coffee?”

“Please.”

“Hello there! It’s midnight and I know these people in the apartment across you have just been killed but…”

“Coffee?”

“Yes please.”

The characters never turn down an offer for coffee. It’s like they prioritise it above everything else. It seems to be drilled into their social genome which is why an explanation -- how do they sleep at night? — isn’t deemed necessary in any of the books. Not a single event takes place without the mention of coffee and occasionally sandwiches. So much so that I smelled hot chocolate mocha during the happier parts and strong machine brewed mush during the tense moments.

But all in all, wasn’t it a spectacular series? I didn’t care much for the third book – everything just fell into place very conveniently, didn’t it? But the first two books had my heart racing and it had nothing to do with an excessive intake of caffeinated drinks.

I loved how The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo set the premise for what’s to follow – Blomkvist, ladies man and a total fool when it comes to physically defending himself and those around him. He even has to be saved every once in a while. Good thing he’s a good at investigative journalism/ detective work and even better than he’s backed up by the most influential independent magazine in Sweden. Lisbeth Salandar, she came alive in my mind. With her gift for breaking into computers and beyond, I couldn’t help but place her in the same league as superheroes like Spidey, Mr Incredible and Iran Man.

The Girl Who Played With Fire gave me reason to wake up every morning and take the train to work – the hour between home and Nariman Point has done wonders for my reading. It’s when the action takes place and the story unfolds. It’s also when Salandar is at her strongest and yet most vulnerable, as she fights her way out of sticky spots, manipulates her powers to survive and realises, during the last few pages, that she is human after all.

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest had promise. I was expecting a long-drawn out trial that broke headlines in Sweden, created chaos and saw a lot of bloodshed. The Section’s attempts at damage control should have caused a lot more trouble, and put everyone’s lives, jobs and minds in jeopardy. But then something unexpected happened.

You know when you’re reading a suspense thriller and you’re like “Oh no! Don’t do that.” “Don’t go in there.” “Please don’t let anything happen to him.” It’s like Larsson preempted this perfectly normal reaction from his readers and ensured that we got just what we asked for. We all know that justice and all that jazz will prevail in 9 out of 10 scenarios. But in this book, not only did justice prevail, but the bad guys also got their just desserts well before the book ended. All the pieces of the puzzles fell into place, Blomkvist became an authority and even the Prime Minister took a special interest. This is where my disappointment stemmed from.

Overall, I think Larsson did a spanking job with the Trilogy. It is well presented, just like a really long investigative feature that you can’t stop reading. But more importantly, it introduces two characters – Kalle Blomkvist and Salander – epic in every form and function who have broken out of the boundaries of Nordic fiction and given suspense writers a higher standard to reach and a wider palate with which to create.

Buy the Millennium Trilogy from Flipkart here and from Amazon here.

RecommendedReads | Of Flies and Forevers

2012-02-21T00:21:00.055+05:30

Copyright and Credit: Eliza Powell (14)
shortlisted for The Lord of the Flies
cover competition by The Guardian

I was almost 20 years old when I first read The Lord of the Flies by William Golding. As a literature student who paid more attention to pulp fiction sold cheap on the streets in order to avoid the prescribed texts, I started to see literature in a whole new light when I devoured it twice in the same week! And both times I didn’t really think of it as a children’s novel, even though it was about children, how they cope with being marooned on a deserted island and go a bit bananas, to put it mildly, without adult supervision.

My school curriculum didn’t have a module to introduce us to English literature, so it makes me jealous when I hear people who’ve analysed texts like Hamlet in-depth before the 10^th grade or in the current scenario, illustrated the cover for a new school edition of The Lord of the Flies for a competition run by The Guardian. Between the ages of 13 and 16, these young adults have gone to town in their attempt to illustrate their vision for the book cover. Pretty, gritty and thought provoking here’s where you can find a slideshow for the short-list and peek in here if you want to learn more about the winner. (Buy a copy of the book from Flipkart here and Amazon here)

Flip open the culture section of any website, newspaper or magazine and there she is – Katherine Boo, whose book Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, death and hope in a Mumbai undercity is getting rave reviews. Boo seems like quite an articulate journalist –she did win a Pulitzer in 2000 for reporting on poverty in the US for the Washington Post – but to do so in a slum in Mumbai without even speaking the language must have required a lot of patience and hard work. I haven’t read the book yet so I don't know about all that she might or might not have achieved. But here are some reviewers who do. The Places in Between | The Economist, Bare Minimum City | The Indian Express , Puncturing a Fable | Mint Lounge

Buy Katherine Boo's Behind the Beautiful Forevers from Flipkart Here and Amazon Here and then read this columnist's expedition to Annawadi for a bit of fact-checking to see whether the world described in the book was indeed real or mild exaggerations of a creative mind.

Guest Post | A Pocket Full of Pages by Sarit Ray

2012-02-20T00:05:00.046+05:30

If you grew up in the Nineties, you’re probably familiar with pocket classics – the squat little books with bold typeface (meant for kids, so easier readability) and black and white illustrations.

I had loads of them. Still do, in fact. My nostalgic mother refuses to throw then away. So, they gather dust somewhere in a forgotten corner of a bookshelf in Calcutta (bottom row, most likely. That’s where the displaced ones go, having made space for the newer, heftier, more serious, some-of-them-autographed books on the upper shelves).

I particularly remember RL Stevenson’s Treasure Island. I don’t think it’s the first book I read, or even the oldest I have. (That has to be the giant, illustrated book of alphabets that was then twice as big as me. Seriously.) But it’s my oldest memory of reading a book. I even faintly remember the sketches of the one-legged Captain Flint with a parrot on his shoulder and a bottle of rum in his hand. ‘Rum’ – It was the first time I heard the word; I loved the musical effect of saying it, and going by the pirate Captain’s fondness, was sure would love its taste too (I do, just not in the way I’d then imagined).

Then there were more: the carefree Huck Finn, cooler in certain ways than Tom Sawyer, and Jim, who was then just Huck’s friend, without any of the colour of race politics I’d decipher much, much later.

It was also my introduction to Shakespeare classics – A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Tempest, Romeo and Juliet. I would read them several times yet; in college, studying literature, I would discover new facets and layers (I’m sure there’s plenty more yet, because that’s what makes Shakespeare so fascinating). But the storylines in my head are still the ones I read back then.

Of course, I deviated. I didn’t just grow up reading classics, going from Illustrated Shakespeare to Complete Works. There was Tinkle, Superman, Tintin, Chacha Chaudhari (Imagine my excitement when I found them at Comic-Con last year), and that prized, hardbound Asterix collection my uncle gave me on a birthday. Lord of the Rings was still a few years away, and JK Rowling would write Harry Potter much later.

There were phases as well: Famous Five, Nancy Drew etc. If young kids now must survive Twilight, we survived Sidney Sheldon (incomparably brighter and surely more realistic than Stephenie Meyer, however).

But it was the pocket classics I must thank, and my parents, of course, who bought them, for my love of reading. Those ritualistic trips to the dusty annual Calcutta Book Fair, hunting for new books, and then clasping on to them in a polythene bag on the way back – I imagine myself as a perfect little picture of an ardent reader. I exaggerate, of course. But more than the time, I’d be glad to find that indomitable desire to read again.

Sarit is an articulate fellow and an excellent writer who didn't need to be bullied into submitting this post at all (let the record state). You should meet him for a coffee sometime to talk about travel, food, film and most importantly, literature. He's also one of the best amateur shutterbugs I know! Take a look through his photos on Flickr and read more of his stuff on Ideas Random

Review | Frank Miller's Bad Boy

2012-02-17T23:13:00.003+05:30

"Maybe it’s a dream or maybe it’s a memory. I don’t know which. I don’t know anything. The air’s cold and it cuts into my lungs. It makes me want a cigarette."

Ever had a nightmare where you’re running with nowhere to hide and the only way out is to leap out of a window or off a cliff? Jason’s living that nightmare. Only in his case it could also be real. Bad Boy, a graphic novel written by Frank Miller with art by Simon Bisley is an intriguing shorter than short graphic novel that lasts all of 15 minutes and what a good 15 minutes it is.

Jason is a young boy. Not older than 8 years if we’re going by size. He’s trying to escape from Sacred Oaks, a prototype world free of drugs, war, meat and to Jason’s distress – cigarettes. The captors look like dangerous robots built out of scrap metal. The doctor looks like a naked Amazon – a centerfold, he calls her – who needs him to obey in order to make Sacred Oaks the perfect place. Who is he? He doesn’t know. How did he get there? He doesn’t know. Why are they so desperate to keep him confined? He’s going to find out.

I joined a library recently. It’s the best thing, I tell you. It’s called Leaping Windows (for Mumbai only) and it’s got a vast collection of graphic novels, comics and Manga that are delivered to your doorstep. I haven’t read too many of these in the past save for the odd Tinkle, Archie and that one time, Watchmen. But I do know that as an ardent fan of the written word, the pictures don’t go a long way if the story’s too short. I can already visualize fans of the art form spitting at their screens and noting my coordinates to come conk me over the head. But that’s just my opinion. Or maybe I’ve just been a bit unlucky and unaware to order the right stuff.

Since I joined Leaping Windows, I’m two books in, I’ve had the misfortune of ordering titles that are 40 pages or less. That’s a whole lot of art work and a wonderfully illustrated story but a short read nonetheless. And when you’re done with one short story, you need to get to the next one.

Then there’s the story itself. Bad Boy would have been brilliant had it been a larger story. It has a promising start – (You’re not my mommy, bitch!)—but it leaves a lot of gaping holes along the way. Jason proclaims they want his mind but to me it seems like the Amazon doctor just wants his compliance. It’s not the same thing, really, is it? Then there’s the matter with Rachel which doesn’t get explained entirely. Why did she try to convince him to go back like she couldn’t do so herself?.... Hold on... *15 minutes later* All right. That explains that I guess.

I like Jason. He a version of Calvin that smokes, swears, hurts and has a cat named Hitler instead of a stuffed tiger. But Mr Miller – this story needs so much more. I implore you to start with answers to the questions already raised, and questions to the answers that came too easily.

Know of any graphic more novels I should read? Please feel free to recommend a title or two. As of now I've got Marvel's Kick Ass in queue.

RecommendedReads | Who wants to be attractive?

2012-02-14T12:54:00.004+05:30

Happy Valentine's Day and all! For those of you who are wondering how to make yourselves more attractive by 9pm tonight, a new translation of the Kama Sutra has a solution: "A paste of rosebay, wild ginger and plum leaves can make one seductive. So can a salve for the eyes made by grinding these same herbs, putting the powder on a wick and burning it with myrobalan oil in a human skull."
Read a more excerpts from the book on thehairpin.com or buy it from Amazon.com for the whole hog this Valentine's Day. A special prize shall go out to the reader who reviews the book for us by Feb 29. Two special prizes if you can wing it by the end of this week.

Now that you're a tad closer to scoring tonight, here's something you might find handy in taking the conversation beyond the run-of-the-mill "Are those eyelashes real?" The Jaipur Literature Festival may be old news in a world of ADD inducing sources that create a hype about something and then abandon them for the next one much like roosters on heat. But here's a column written around that time you might have missed in the headlines that were dominated by Rushdie and Oprah. This piece in The New York Times by Manu Joseph, author of Serious Men and editor of Open Magazine, talks about the world of publishing and the quality of Indian English literature in relation to the the hype that surrounds its authors. It's not time or event specific so you must read it if you haven't already.

In other, more current news, a book that I'm personally itching to read Narcopolis by Jeet Thayil is on stands now. The name does sound intriguing, doesn't it? The plot, even more so. Juxtapose that with reality and we might just have a book club discussing Opium in the time of a serial killer who smashes your head in with a stone. For an interesting take on Narcopolis, you might want to read what this columnist for Mumbai Boss has to say.

Stories in Sound | The Hanging Cot by KK Meera

2012-02-11T19:24:00.006+05:30

“There was something evil about Grandma’s death….”

"Who knew Tamil literature did magic realism?" I thought as the reading started at the David Sassoon Library Gardens on Friday evening. I hadn't really planned on visiting the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival but the prospect of attending a reading by my friend Rohini gave me incentive to get off my ass and do something about it.

First stop: 'The Great Indian Novel – Only in Translation?', a session moderated by Bengali translator, Anurava Sinha featuring readings by Anju Makhija (translator of Shah Abdul Latif’s Shah Jo Riosalo from Sindhi to English with Seeking The Beloved), RJ Rohini Ramanathan (host of the longest running amateur poetry slam in Mumbai) and Neil Debdutt Paul (Editor of Tinkle Comics).

Over a few beers after the session, I managed to bully Rohini into recording The Hanging Cot by KR Meera, a story both eerie and schizophrenic. I didn’t actually think she would have the time to do it on a working Saturday but she managed to squeeze it in somehow. The story is part of a larger book called Yellow is the Colour of Longing that has been translated from Tamil to English by J Devika.

We've had a lot of contributors since we started this blog and they've really helped expand our portfolio from rants and reviews to include fiction, poetry, analysis and now podcasts! I'd really like to thank Rohini (may the lord bless her with a 1000 saris) for taking the initiative to do this for us. And may we always find supporters who help us push the envelope to make this blog bigger and better!

So without further ado I’d like to present The Caterpillar Café’s first ever podcast published in two parts amounting to 12 minutes in total.

Part 1

Part 2

Like what you hear? Follow RJ Rohini on Facebook and Twitter.

RecommendedReads | Beautiful bookshops

2012-02-09T11:45:00.002+05:30

Rizzoli Bookstore, 57th Street, New York

Headline: The 20 most beautiful bookstores in the world

Publication: Flavorwire
Rizzoli on 57th Street has to be one of my favorite bookstores. I was naive enough to think it was a secret find before I realized that everyone knew about it. Oh well, it is still quaint and does not have a sprawling cafe where everyone does everything but read a book. The arched mullioned windows and dim ocher lighting make me want to wear tweed and smoke a pipe. It's a Taschen friendly bookshop that caters to large illustrated books as well as rare jewels. Then of-course there is Blackwell's in Oxford, not particularly pretty but it has an entire section devoted to Tolkien which is good enough for me. Finally I don't know how many of you recall The Turtle Bookshop (I think it was called that) in Khan Market, Delhi. I used to love that little place with its penchant for Mirza Ghalib and Everyman classics. Then there is Bombay's very own Strand at Fountain where I got my first Everyman Library book ten years ago. Go ahead and read Flavorwire's take on their 20 most beautiful bookstores in the world. Also write in and tell us about your favorite bookshops with pictures. We will post them online.

Right-click and open in a new tab

The dedicated Tolkien section at Blackwells in Oxford

Lost and Found

2012-02-02T23:51:00.004+05:30

To those who’ve borrowed my books. I’ll get them back slowly but surely. To those whose books I’ve borrowed – I love you! They shall be returned with a note of gratitude and a cupcake.

She gave me the most beautiful dress I’ve ever owned. We walked into a closet that would make Carrie Bradshaw's penthouse look like cardboard box, and with a hint of sadness in her eyes, Shruti bequeathed me with a treasure she said didn’t quite go on her. She’s a fashionista, she is. She’s generous too. She’ll lend you a dress (within reason, so don’t take this as a testimonial for some free service) when you think you’ve got nothing that will do justice to an occasion. But don’t…ever…ask…to borrow one of her books. The answer, I’ll tell you right now, is NO!

It was a beautiful copy of Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro which sat on her newly stocked bookshelf. It seemed to be making a pass at me. “Take me home,” it said in a low, seductive voice. “Just a fling for a few nights and then you can bring me straight back home.”

“I don’t let people borrow my books,” was her response when I told her about this conversation. I couldn’t help but point out that she had just given me – straight out of her closet and into a paper bag, please, it will totally look better on you – a beautiful peach dress. Then why couldn’t stand to part with, for a day or two months, a book she had just finished reading a few weeks ago?

It’s like she said. She didn’t loan her books out to people and the reason though curt, was straight forward: “People never return them (“I do,” I argued to deaf ears) and I’ve lost too many books to even begin accounting for where they went.” That’s when I felt my ego begin to crack and started poking, prodding and even resorting to bratty emotional blackmail (“But I will die if I don’t read it!”) to have my way.

Thing is, I really want to read Never Let Me Go. But buying it isn’t on top of my literary priorities. The prospect of borrowing it just seemed better at the time so I wanted to make the most of having a friend who owned a copy.

But her refusal made me think about her passion for the shelf she is so painstakingly building with books she will either read immediately or save until a later date. They’re her friends and she’ll do anything to keep them feeling safe and appreciated. I couldn’t help but respect that – at first because she didn’t give me much of a choice – and then think about how much sense it made. How many books have I lost track of over the years? There’s The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, one of my favourite books to date. Not to mention My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk, a gift from a dear friend at university. Then there’s Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri with Hema and Kaushik, a story so sad that I still cry when I think of it. And then there are several others which were equally important to me, but have been gone so long that they only come back to me when a conversation, an incident or a stray thought on the Mumbai Local sends me running to my bookshelf to locate them in vain.

Clothes wear out or go out of fashion. But books are eternal, like diamonds. They’re your friends who tell you stories that make you laugh, cry, take you places you’ve never seen and educate you beyond anything a fancy education can ever offer.

Shruti’s got a good policy that I’m about to adopt. Keep your books close to your heart and don’t borrow those that mean something to others. Because books belong to you though, more importantly, you belong to your books.

Poetry | Solitaire

2012-01-25T10:30:00.000+05:30

Blue smoke or is it gray?

Myself, a glass of red,

and a stick they call death

are best friends, I say.

Nothing better to take you back to

places you would like to go to,

to places you have been.

And get in touch with the person you know

Or haven’t met in weeks.

As premiums rush though your head

Inane talk puts you to sleep

better than Nyquil.

Anonymity exists I say

In certain places still

if you are lucky enough to find it.

To build stories,

enlarged versions of your truth.

And I write, with my sails possessed

With tricks of a mage

That guide me through entrails

of conversation

and lead me home

to sleep.

Blissful sleep.

Reshma Krishnan

Fine Fiction | Sweet Loretta

2012-01-23T00:00:00.000+05:30

Warren D'Sylva

Warren is a lovely guy who likes lovely things. He enjoys a spot of corporate slavery during the day and writing fiction by night. His body of work includes several plays (some of which actually make it to the stage) and short stories that he publishes HERE. We at The Caterpillar Cafe are super thrilled to expand our blog to include fiction (finally) with Sweet Loretta, a day in the life of a homeless lady getting by on the community's mercy and if need be, guilt. Hope you enjoy it!
- Afsha

IT'S STILL SOME TIME BEFORE Loretta takes her morning walk down our street, which at this moment is at a perfect calm of deadpan, save for the sound of bread trays being pulled out of the bakery’s oven. She’s just begun her morning ablutions down by the rocks behind the old graveyard, where she sometimes goes to visit the dead asking for a place to stay.
It will take her some time before she passes this street.
The bakery is the first to roll up its shutters, but the salesmen are still in the backrooms touching each other and kneading dough with their feet. An old woman makes her way to church, her face the life source of the morning’s deadpan.

The church bells sound, but nothing moves, save for the old woman’s fingers that have just crawled into her bra for a bit of a scratch. A milkman zips by on his cycle. He’s hurrying to catch a glimpse of a woman bathing behind the rocks. Four milkmen and three paperboys convene each morning for a private showing on the rocks just behind the graveyard. But, he’s late today because Loretta’s already put her clothes on and left the scene. He’ll have to hear it from the paperboys who’ve been giving serious thought to investing in a camera.
She’s older now. Her eyes have yellowed and her teeth have long since left their birthplace. But, nothing a little liquor can’t fix, she’d say. She was on her way to the joint or permit room as they say these days when she ran into the old woman on her way to church.
“Morning Doris,” Loretta greeted in her high-pitched voice. She knew the names of most of the morning’s usual suspects.
“Morning,” Doris replied out of duty.
“Doris you’ve got a ten-er to spare? Give me please I need to go to the market today. I wanted to buy my dress material for Christmas.”
“I don’t have any money.”
“Ten rupees you don’t have?”
“No,” said Doris as she crossed the threshold of the big church door and sat beside the statue of St. Anthony. For Doris, Charity began at home. But, it never left the house to accompany her anywhere.
Loretta stood outside cursing and turned to complain to a statue of Christ the King, where she was joined by two other complainants and a petitioner. Loretta walked up beside the petitioner and using the petitioner’s ear as a microphone, complained to Christ the King about Doris being a selfish hypocrite whose prayers should not be entertained today. She even complained about the house down our street that’s not being used. Finally, her complaints grew softer and warmer and slowly evolved into a petition that was only meant to reach the ear of the petitioner beside her. Without turning around, he took out a ten rupee note from his breast pocket and handed it to her. She took it saying, “thank you, God bless you and may He grant you all that you ask for, just don’t ask for a house because he never gives those away” and turning around she left.
The joint was empty save for Gabby the one-eyed Casanova and Placid the bartender whose face was a deserving runner up to the morning deadpan award.
Placid’s bar is a story in itself and should be told one day, but today we’re waiting for Loretta to finish her drink and pass by our door. She’s finished her first drink and is contemplating a second, when Gabby the one eyed Casanova gets off his stool and walks over to her table to sit beside her. She ignores him even though he’s the only man in the world who really makes her feel like a woman all over again.
“Can I buy you a drink?”
“No thank you. “
“You always smell so good in the morning. Doesn’t she always smell good, huh? Placid, doesn’t she always smell good?”
Placid doesn’t reply lest he lose his place as Dead Pan Runner Up ’08.
“Tomorrow I’m going to bring you flowers. You like flowers? I’ll bring you nice flowers? Huh? You want flowers or no?”
“I don’t want anything from you.”
“You want a drink? I’ll buy you a drink. I’ll buy you one drink if you drink with me. You don’t talk to me. Just drink with me. Huh? Placid. Drinks. Repeat.
They drink in silence. Gabby keeps his promise and says nothing, but this moment is secretly the best time she’s had all week. She finishes her drink and mumbles something about market and dress material and leaves.

She makes her way past the fisherwomen and vegetable carts. She picks up a carrot and puts it in her little cloth purse that hangs around her neck. She makes a stop at a grocery store to ask for a cup of rice, which she fills in her cloth purse.
It’s only a few minutes before she turns down our road, but before her comes Doris from church. She’s in a better mood because the parish priest stopped to chat with her in the sacristy. She had asked to make her confession even though she knew that God knew that she hadn’t sinned since 1987. Her confession was more a set of complaints that really needed to be addressed at the office of Christ the King out front. But, the parish priest listened in silence and raised his hand - by the power vested in him - to forgive her, which was something she secretly thought was very hot. She replayed that final blessing in her head all the way home, which was why she had smiled at us when she passed our house.

Loretta made one last stop at the bakery on the corner of our street where she flirted with the salesman for a loaf of bread. The bread was for her pet dog named Bird. As she approached, we could hear her singing

“I’m coming home I’ve done my time. Now I’ve got to know what is and isn’t mine. If you received my letter telling you I’d soon be free. Then you’ll know just what to do if you still want me. If you still want me.”

She trailed off just before taking a seat at the bottom of our steps. She took the rice out in her hand and handed it to my mother saying,
“Just make this for me and put some chicken curry at the base like they do with biryanis. I feel like a biryani today and I didn’t want to buy one from the shop. Why spend unnecessarily, no? Correct? I wanted to go to the market today to buy something for Christmas. Have you done your Christmas shopping? What happened? You look very tired. You should make yourself a cool glass of lemonade. Go. Go make yourself something cool and make one for me as well. Actually I’ll have a beer. You’ve got any beer? I’d like a cool beer from Leopold Café. What say? You want a cool beer from Leopold Café in Colaba? I’m going there tomorrow. I need to go to Crawford market and buy some material, then I’ll go to my mummy’s house for lunch, take a nap in the afternoon and in the evening we’ll dress up and go to Leopold Café. They’ve got lovely prawn biryani. Prawns are very expensive now. That’s because there are no prawns in the sea. If you want good prawns you come with me. I’ll take you to a place in Dockyard. I know a chap there who used to sell me the best prawns. Twenty rupees for ten tiger prawns.” She took a moment to visualize ten tiger prawns and a Russian salad.
“What happened? You look very tired. You should take some medicine. I just took my medicine in the morning and now I feel good. You must look after yourself. See I just went and got myself a summer haircut. What do you think?”
She took off her headscarf to display a shiny baldhead.
“It’s my summer haircut. I showed it to Bird and he just couldn’t stop laughing. He’s going a little mad I think because he laughs all the time. There’s nothing wrong in laughing, you’re right, but you can’t be laughing all the time, people will think you’re mad like Doris. I know she doesn’t laugh at all, but she’s mad. You know something; she’s not to be trusted. She’s a cunning woman I tell you. Do you know what she did? Never mind, it’s not my business to get involved.”
She went silent for a while, but you could see from her eyes that her mind was racing… to another time, perhaps? A moment in her youth when she studied at St. Xavier’s College or another time when she was in love. But, that was a painful memory, we were told. The doctors said that it was a memory buried so deep that she would never be able to recall it, except maybe in dreams. Nobody knows why he left. Some say it was another woman, others say that she was always a bit cuckoo and so he left and some believe that it had nothing to do with a man at all. But, nobody knows the real reason for a woman - once beautiful, educated and cultured - to be found naked eighteen years ago in our church compound beside the statue of Our Lady. We only know that she never returned to her past world, which in reality was a twenty-minute ride on the train.
“What are you thinking?” She asked me. “You’re very pensive this morning. Don’t think, just enjoy life and be happy. As long as you have a house and a mother you’ll be happy. I tell Bird that everyday. He’s got a house and a mummy. He’s very happy. I don’t know when I’m going to move into my house. Did you find out about the key to that house upstairs? Find me a key for that house. There’s nobody using it. At least I’ll open it up, air it out, clean it up and use it. A house is meant to be a home for somebody, not a morgue for furniture. Am I right? She stopped talking and broke out into song again.
“I’m coming home I’ve done my time.
Now I’ve got to know what is and isn’t mine…”
“That’s my Bird’s favorite song. Just see if the biryani’s ready. I don’t want to waste my morning sitting. You shouldn’t be sitting either. It’s not ready? Shall I go and do my marketing and come back? Will it be ready by then? Make me some salad also; a fresh green salad with some cucumber and carrot. Here take this carrot. I bought it from the market this morning. You want some beer? Shall I pick up some beer? No? Ok, just keep the biryani ready. What are you cooking for tomorrow? How about some fried pomfret or some shellfish? There’s a lot of shellfish in the market. Let me see what I can get. In the meantime, you keep the biryani ready and just see about that key. Ask them to give it to you. But, don’t mention it to Doris. She’s a twisted woman."
She stood up to leave, but sat down again because at that moment Gabby the one-eyed Casanova was walking by dragging his cycle along. He spotted her and stopped for a moment. He smiled like a schoolboy and not knowing what to do, he simply carried on, discussing the matter with his cycle as he passed.
“He’s in love with me,” she said to us. “I don’t think I love him back. But, I’ll wait and see. If he gets me flowers I’ll think about it.” She laughed to herself and stood up and left.

Book Review | Such a shame, Mr Darcy!

2012-01-18T09:00:00.000+05:30

We now leave the the foggy streets of London and take a trip to the Pemberly estate to read Death Comes To Pemberly by P D James. Have you ever wondered how Lizzie and Darcy got on after they got over their pride and buried their prejudice. (Couldn't resist, sorry) Were they happy and did they fall deeply in love? Did Lizzie honestly marry him for love because I always suspected it was money? Did Jane find out that Mr Bingley was really a closet cross dresser? I always wished that Austen wrote a sequel and here we have it. Not by Austen but by the world's leading mistress of crime - P D James. Introducing her would take an entire post, so suffice to say that if there was going to be a crime at Pemberly, she should be the best person to write. It seems not.

The Guardian's Review made me chuckle!

Despite a few lukewarm reviews and a particularly sardonic one from The Guardian , I insisted on buying it. She is after all, P D James!

It all begins at Pemberly on the night leading up to a grand ball thrown in the honor of Mr Darcy's mother. James spends an inordinate amount of time summarizing a story that we all know so bloody well that by the fifth page you you want to say - get on with it. Finally she does. That fateful night, a series of circumstances culminate in a murder involving that villain Wickham and arrest of a possibly innocent man. What transpires after is a slow detective story that plods along, there were no detectives or resources at the time to actually solve a crime. So it falls upon Darcy and a few old magistrates to get to the bottom of this most horrible incident that has befallen upon the great house of Pemberly. What conjecture follows involves a series of unnecessary summaries of the actual event. After a while I found myself thinking, "If I hear that one more time, I will throw this book." But I couldn't because it was an IPAD; The dark side of technology. Through it all we are never given a glimpse into the marriage we so want to be a part of or the character that made Ms Bennet so formidable. She seems to have morphed into this nervous whiny society woman that needs valium. Then there is the revelation of Mr Darcy's name but really, do we need to have another character with the same name?

The silver lining however is Mr Darcy. This is really his story and I think that is where James is most comfortable. You realize that she always understood men better. She invests time in getting to know this man and pushing his buttons so that through the plot and dialogue, what little there is, we see various shades of his otherwise stoic character come to life. His tenderness is sublime along with his insight into himself and how his weaknesses have obstructed him from actually solving the case.

The usual cast features to some degree, including the charming Mr Bennet. The ninety-year old P D James justified this book in an interview by saying that she did not want to die in the middle of a Dalgliesh story and really wanted to write something fun. While I hope she had a complete ball because her customary technique with plot fails to deliver here as this was a book that needed some fluffy emotional dialogue and James, always preferring to keep personal feelings at the periphery, struggles to make mundane conversation. Any glimpse we had of Dalgliesh's personal life was akin to a large bar of luxurious dark chocolate, not to be overindulged in. In this case, we needed more drama, more dialogue, more masala since the deduction is quite elementary and really Pride and Prejudice was after all one of the best chick-lits of all time.

Verdict - Only for die hard PD James fans and those who just have to read any novel involving Darcy. I think it's worth it for him. Was never a fan of Lizzie anyway!
You can buy Death comes to Pemberly here.

My suggestion is to buy yourself a beautiful hardback edition of Pride and Prejudice, worth every penny instead.

And for a taste of PD James at her best, check out our post Rainy Day Reads

Postcards from Another World | A tale of two cities

2012-01-15T11:03:00.000+05:30

Just off Xizang road, there is a crisscross of two blocks that will cover your gifting obligations for at least a year. From a stall that boasts teapots from 1940 to a splattering of Cultural Revolution memorabilia that includes the infamous Little Red book- a compilation of Chairman Mao’s revolutionary quotations. The street is also a kaleidoscope of images of every day Shanghainese life away from the glittering towers, visible over the houses in the horizon. You will get a glimpse into the Shikumenhomes- row houses where community of families’ share common living areas. It brings Shanghai’s contradictions into jarring focus.

Even a nosy photographer cannot distract
them from a game of Mahjong

A tale of two cities - Shanghai

For more postcards please visit Postcards from Another World

For guidebooks on Shanghai check out out post Travel guides in disguise | Red Mandarin Dress by Qiu Xiaolong

Book Reviews | This is a London particular . . . A fog, miss

2012-01-10T18:19:00.001+05:30

And what a Dickensian book adventure it was. Two books, a cold new year in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, Edinburgh, followed by a foggy week in the most atmospheric city I have lived in has to be the perfect start to the New Year. It began with Antony Horowitz's A House of Silk. Those who are familiar with young adult literature would know him as the thrilling author of the teenage spy series, Alex Rider, however my own soft corner for him stems out of the fact that he is indeed the brilliance behind one of my all time favorite series - Midsomer Murders. Yes that village in England that should be up there with the flu on how many people it has managed to put away. So when I saw The House Of Silk winking at me from a shelf in my trusty Coimbatore Airport Book Shop with an added subtitle- The New Sherlock Holmes novel, jiminy cricket, the novel was in my bag and I had forfeited any plans to do work during the new year weekend.

I went in with no preconceptions considering that most attempts at awakening beloved characters, albeit in trepidation, have failed. Off the top of my fingers, Gone with the wind and a bad sequel to Pride and Prejudice. But Mr Horowitz delivers and may I say, in a fine manner. He was commissioned by the estate of Sherlock Holmes and to that end, formed rules which he promised not to break, in-particular not to indulge in romance or vulgarity.

The story is set in 1890 and is told in a series of flashbacks by the sturdy Dr Watson, who in his final days decides it is time to reveal Holmes's most brutal case. A case so sensational, that to reveal at the time would have been tantamount to ruining so many lives and tearing the very fabric of london society. So we are transported back to 221 B, Baker street and the familiar routine of Mrs Hudson serving tea and scones while Holmes glances surreptitiously at his achilles heel on a mantelpiece. Watson is in throes of marital bliss when in walks a client who is being stalked. A simple robbery leads to a revelation that will shatter London society.To tell you anything more would be criminal (couldn't resist) but the story unravels at a ferocious pace only slowing somewhere in the middle when it looks like all is lost and your favorite detective seems doomed. Antony wanted to recreate the detective but not reinvent him and so remains faithful to the familiar tone of Watson as well as the charming arrogance of Holmes. He also excels at creating a slum ridden Victorian London. It's seedy alleyways, a stinky Thames bears a sharp contrast to the city today and reflects the impeccable research that Horowitz undertook to be true to the work. He also weaves the story in seamlessly with the present Sherlock Holmes canon with taut inferences to the future and the past as well as the appearance of certain characters like Lestrade. I always thought Lestrade a bit of an idiot, but here he redeems himself. Ooh better stop there before I reveal it all. Altogether a fantastic read, bound in a beautiful black textured cover. This is one for the Library so get invest in the physical version and sit down on your chaise/sofa/mat with a cuppa tea. The game is afoot...

Tommorow, we revisit another revival Death comes to Pemberly - P D James.

India: The House of Silk from Flipkart.com

Everywhere Else: The House of Silk from Amazon.com

Poetry | Chicken Shit Triangles

2012-01-10T10:00:00.001+05:30

Love Triangles Gone Bad
-Ben Walker

She watches you from the corner of her

eye as you look at me
and as I watch this three way

Glance of love and hate.

As we sit at the table,
the electricity is undeniable

And so are the silent accusations of late.

We are playing risk games with the most fragile of all men,

We go round and round this same circle and then we all fall down again.

But never do we learn, I think to my self

As a slow sip of water I go to take.

And as a slow roasted chicken comes from her end to mine

If she had her way that chicken would blind

If I had mine, that chicken would weep

And if you had yours, two chickens you would keep.

To feed your ego the way you want them to

Narcissus you are, as much as I love you.

This whole scene in slow motion would be cruel

To mostly her,
as she doesn’t know the rules

Of the games we now play.

To me it’s sad, pathetic, one might say

To think that you will live your life like this,

Always wanting what you will always miss.

To you its frustration, that you cannot really have

This constant situation, one for your heart

And another for your bed.

To others at this table it’s just a story of thrill

Of three people having dinner,

never having their fill.

To life and big picture,
it’s just as significant as about the profundity of chicken shit.

- Reshma Krishnan

More Poetry from Caterpillar Cafe'

The Honeycomb World
The Blind Watchmaker
A Poem for No One

Author Spotlight | Etgar Keret

2012-01-09T00:01:00.008+05:30

Reality takes a backseat when Etgar Keret writes a short story. But in the guise of magic realism, the truth of the matter is very much there, hiding, waiting to jump out from between the lines. Trick is that you have to catch it before the story ends.

Discovering Keret wasn’t difficult. His short story, Creative Writing was published in The New Yorker last week and I found it depressing that I hadn’t heard of him before. So I did a bit of research, code for typing words into Google, read some of his other works and was pleasantly surprised to find that each story was more impressive than the last. Guava is the story of a man whose flight is about to crash and his last wish isn't that his wife and family live in comfortable abundance forever after, but for world peace. Creative Writing is about Maya and three really fantastical worlds she creates in a creative writing class, much to the disdain and curiousity of her husband who starts to take them a tad more seriously than he should. Stupour of Our Time is a narrator's analysis of his father's insistence on voting for political parties that do not get to parliment. It's hilarious, batty and strangely, identifiable with at least one or more members of your own family. In The Nimrod Flipout, the narrator and his friends, Miron and Uzi go uncontrollaby insane in turns, and blame it on their dead friend Nimrod.

Keret's stories are short... shorter than the usual short, and extremely insane. So obviously I'm in love with him. He's got this rare talent that allows him to establish characters in a limited amount of time despite the length. Of course, there's only one to three characters in each story, so that limits the complexity to a large extent. Does that make him simple to 'get'? Not really. But reading him, somehow, transports you to this world where nothing and no one else really matters but the main character and the path leading down to the climax.

Journalism school aims to teach you a lot of things - check facts, establish integrity, don't commit suicide unless you're in a war zone chasing a story, and hate McJournalism (longer stories presented as short nuggets of information) to name a few.

Keret's stories remind me of this paper I wrote about McJournalism and how shorter news stories (in some cases as long as 250 words and as short as 140 characters) aren't giving the audience the opportunity to understand an incident in a fair and balanced manner. Keret's shorter than shorts did bring this theory back to mind when Creative Writing left me wanting more. Much, much more than another story with another protagonist facing another crisis. So I can see why he wasn't too popular with critics in the start. One columnist went so far as to say he is "not so much of a stylist - you get the impression that he throws three or four of these stories off on the bus to work every morning". But if you're a grown-up who isn't experimenting with illicit substances, you know how difficult it is to imagine something that, well, isn't, no matter how much you enjoy it. So to me this statement is appalling, and a very haphazard judgement to pass because stories as fantastical as these don't get "thrown" on a bus, toilet or even during intense boredom. They're nuggets, yes I said it, of inspiration that come in spurts that must be penned down before they get diluted by distraction or logical thinking.

These shorter than short stories aren't Keret's only source of fame. He's a filmmaker of good repute in Israel (I haven't seen the film yet) and has collaborated on several graphic novels (which I haven't read yet). His website is quite interesting for, you know, an author's website, woven around a theme that reminds me of Phoebe from Friends talking about her song: 'Su-Su-Suicide'. He also writes articles that find their way into The New Yorker, New York Times and The Guardian among others. Indeed, Keret, the storyteller, is definitely someone you should keep an eye on. He's a revelation of sorts, my first revelation for that matter, in the new year.

(India) Buy The Nimrod Flip-Out, a collection of Keret's short stories from Flipkart.com

(Everywhere Else) The Nimrod Flipout: Stories on Amazon.com

New Year Giveaway | And the winners are...

2012-01-07T12:39:00.005+05:30

DRUMROLL.....

One Day - airborne

After Dark - janosch

Good Omens - Malini AKA ru

Congratulations! Please send us your postal addresses to afsha.khan@gmail.com so we may contact you to deliver your prizes.

And the early bird winners of The Caterpillar Cafe' bookmark that my bloggie makes with such love are...

Aparna Jaykumar
Anuradha
Justjabberwocky
Malini aka ru
and
Whatever-very nice ditty there by the way.

Please feel free to give us recommendations for books you want us to giveaway and we will consider them in our next quiz in February.

And to further sweeten the day I leave you with one of my favorite poems- Birches by Robert Frost, a crowd pleaser if you may that will delight you and perhaps take you back to your childhood when you were a swinger of branches and a dreamer of dreams. Happy New Year!

Autumn photograph of the Shelburne Birchesnear Gorham,
New Hampshire.

BIRCHES Robert Frost (1875-) WHEN I see birches bend to left and right
Across the line of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay.
Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them	5
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells	10
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust—
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed	15
So low for long, they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.	20
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm
(Now am I free to be poetical?)
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows—	25
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again	30
Until he took the stiffness out of them,
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away	35
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,	40
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.

So was I once myself a swinger of birches;
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood	45
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.	50
May no fate wilfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,	55
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches

Pretty Pondicherry and the travel guide that isn't

2012-01-05T09:45:00.008+05:30

We would have ridden the bicycles to our room, but they got stolen from the poolside restaurant. That's how the unwritten code of honour – 'Thou shall not seal another man's transport in Dune Eco Village and Spa' – found itself in the pooper and experience #58 Ride a bike to your room, listed in Peter Richards' 108 Experiences in Pondicherry, Auroville and Nearby got slashed with a pointy pencil. The book itself is still nestled in my handbag for quick access should I need a pick-me-up in the middle of a workday.

108 Experiences in Pondicherry, Auroville and Nearby is unlike any travel guide you have ever read. That is precisely what makes it the perfect companion for a footloose idiot passing through the union territory. You see, Pondicherry isn't a very big place and once you're through entertaining yourself with the street names – Rue Dumas, Rue Romain Rollard, Rue Jawaharlal Nehru – and done a few rounds of the churches, temples and Aurovilian shops, you need to do something to experience the place, like really grab a slice of it, you know? Richards, by no stretch of the imagination, takes you off the beaten path. He takes you through the same sights, sounds and stories but turns it into an adventure with a sense of humour.

The Manakula Vinayaka Temple is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Pondicherry. But it's no great shakes if you're a non-religious vegabond with no reason to go to a house of worship unless you're allowed to take photos, which, a lot of times, you're not. But the prospect of a tap from Lakshmi, the beautiful elephant who spends her days here, is enough to excite believers and non-believers alike. What's more is that because she is outside the prayer area, the millisecond you get to bow in front of her turns into a full fledged photo op that will put a shutterbug's skills to the test. Word to the wise - give her 10 one rupee coins rather than one 10 rupee note. #2. Get off to a good start. Be tapped by an elephant.

If the strong currents thrashing about in the Bay of Bengal aren't enough to keep your feet on dry, sandy shores, you should also know that swimming in Pondicherry also happens to be illegal. But alas, there isn't a sign board that announces this. I guess the lifeguards just sit around hoping the waves at high tide will keep pushing people out of the water over and over again, allowing them a few added moments of lathargic stupor. But if you're really quite adamant, do what my sister and I did as chidren - play Baywatch in the swimming pool. If your hotel doesn't have one, the book suggests a few hotels that allow visitors acess to massive pools for a small fee. #57 We're your designated lifeguard

“If you don't know what your booty is we can't help you. It's your booty.” Wise words, these. #77 Dance your booty off, though I don't know why anyone would pick Pondicherry for this activity. Even Bangaloreans and Chennaiites, frustrated with the ban on dancing in their cities, might think twice before picking Pondy to wear out their dancing shoes. As a Bombayite the only thing I wanted to take advantage of was the food and cheap booze and the fact that they have no alcohol and service tax to speak of. Richards believes Asian House on beach road is a good place to shimmy-shake. But I'd suggest you skip that bit and go to the roadside cart right opposite which makes beautifully marinated prawns, quail, fish and chicken that go perfectly with a cold bottle of beer.

Some experiences are hilarious to read (#7 Watch paint peel) until you realise that they're arbitrary and nothing more than fillers to reach a number higher than 100. But that shouldn't discourage you from buying this handy little book. If you have limited time to spend in Pondicherry, then most of the pointers will keep you curious enough until you make another trip. Be warned though, not all experiences are unique to the union territory -- lose a beggar, load up on sandalwood soap, read The Hindu -- but the index at the back is dead useful. With a list of places to visit, a map showing where they're placed and cross references to the experiences you can weave around them, the book gives back more than the 150 rupees it costs.

Not available on Flipkart, unfortunately. I bought my copy from Gratitude Heritage on Rue Romain Rollard.

P.S. Two more days to enter your name for The Caterpillar Cafe New Year giveaways.

Postcards from Another World | Shanghai upon-the-sea

2012-01-03T10:00:00.000+05:30

Watching the world go by-
Dong Tai Antique Market, Shanghai

The showcase city of a nation with over 5000 years of history is bound to be staggering and a top ten list is hard to put together without leaving out something worthwhile. Shanghai is less a place of things to see and more a place of things to experience. Don’t be perturbed by the lack of color that hits you as you exit Shanghai Pudong International Airport, as the glass, concrete and grey quickly give way to innumerable splashes of red and green. To read more about my top ten places to visit in Shanghai please visit Postcards from another world

Happy Holidays| New Year Giveaways

2011-12-30T09:01:00.010+05:30

The weekend of excesses is finally here. While Reshma is off to Edinburgh to headbang in a ball gown to the music of Still Death (or something life that), I will be staying in Mumbai, reveling in rest, relaxation and movies I didn’t get to watch during the year.

But before we sign off for the weekend we wanted to wish all of you a very Happy New Year! We sincerely hope that you see at least 3 resolutions through, and read all the books on your wish list.

To add some cheer to the season, we have decided to give away three books in the coming week. Just look at the titles above (selected totally at random) and use the comments section to tell us which one you want and why.

Rules: Wittiness could earn you one points. Randomness, maybe two! Only one entry per reader. No borders or boundaries - readers from across the world may enter.

We’re also giving out 5 Caterpillar Café bookmarks to the first five people who write in so hurry if you want your name stamped on those.

We will pick our winners at random and get in touch over email for your address. Contest closes on January 6 and winners will be announced the next day.

Happy Holidays! Hope you drink like a great white shark, and have a somewhat productive year ahead.

Postcards from another world | New York New York (Part 2)

2011-12-27T13:38:00.002+05:30

Bridges of Madison Avenue, a brief but passionate affair with my credit card

Madison Avenue is to fashion what Amadei is to chocolate, the crème de la crème. Here you will find the floating hangers of Emanual Ungarowhere a skirt goes for $2000 a piece or the original bandage dress byHerve Leger- made famous by our very own Ms Priyanka Chopra. This French fashion house would be considered quite the filly in comparison to the rest of the French stable and was started by Hervé L. Leroux in 1985.

Read more at Postcards from Another World

Poetry | Merry Christmas!!! Ho Ho Ho...

2011-12-25T09:45:00.002+05:30

Lewis Carroll (1832-1898)

Lady, dear, if Fairies may

For a moment lay aside

Cunning tricks and elfish play,

'Tis at happy Christmas-tide.

We have heard the children say -

Gentle children, whom we love -

Long ago on Christmas Day,

Came a message from above,

Still, as Christmas-tide comes round,

They remember it again -

Echo still the joyful sound

"Peace on earth, good-will to men!"

Yet the hearts must childlike be

Where such heavenly guests abide;

Unto children, in their glee,

All the year is Christmas-tide!

Thus, forgetting tricks and play

For a moment, Lady dear,

We would wish you, if we may,

Merry Christmas, Glad New Year!

RecommendedReads | Weekend poetry

2011-12-17T13:19:00.001+05:30

Slyvia Plath's Bell Jar

Headline: Slyvia Plath's Unbearable Lightness

Publication: The Economist's intelligent life

Reshma Says: Good poetry is powerful. When I cut my wrist open while lifting a jug full of watermelon juice and saw the red blossom out of a gash, the first thought that came to mind was was *&#%! quickly followed by 'What a Thrill, my thumb instead of an onion'; the opening lines of Slyvia Plath's brilliant poem Cut. I am in no position to critique her poetry since I got a measly C at English A Level but I do love it. And for others who love it as much as me her pen and ink sketches are on show Mayor Gallery in London. For fans closer to home here is one of my all time favorite poems. Preferably neither read before nor after food.

Cut

for Susan O'Neill Roe

What a thrill ----

My thumb instead of an onion.

The top quite gone

Except for a sort of hinge

Of skin,

A flap like a hat,

Dead white.

Then that red plush.

Little pilgrim,

The Indian's axed your scalp.

Your turkey wattle

Carpet rolls

Straight from the heart.

I step on it,

Clutching my bottle

Of pink fizz. A celebration, this is.

Out of a gap

A million soldiers run,

Redcoats, every one.

Whose side are they one?

O my

Homunculus, I am ill.

I have taken a pill to kill

The thin

Papery feeling.

Saboteur,

Kamikaze man ----

The stain on your

Gauze Ku Klux Klan

Babushka

Darkens and tarnishes and when

The balled

Pulp of your heart

Confronts its small

Mill of silence

How you jump ----

Trepanned veteran,

Dirty girl,

Thumb stump.

Headline: Christopher Hitchens Obituary - Where have all the journalists gone?
Publication: The Guardian
Reshma Says: When was the last time you read something that jolted you or opened your eyes to a new thought? Who is your go to person for an opinion in politics? Don't know. Our parents would have said N Ram at The Hindu or S. Gurumurthy at the Indian Express. So you didn't agree with them or their sometimes extreme views but at least they were consistent and always questioning. No, Frontline is not my favorite magazine but at least it stands for something. Now opinions don't matter because honestly when was the last time someone really knew their stuff. Our views are governed by noises emanating from the television craving for TRP's. They shout, they dramatize in the end telling you what you possibly already know. This is a lovely obituary that also seems to double up as a tribute to the lost art of standing your ground. A fine tribute to a rockstar journalist whose life seems almost as dramatic as the events and people he covered.
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Review | A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness

2011-12-15T10:02:00.000+05:30

What happens when Anne Rice meets Nora Roberts meets Dan Brown. You get a star crossed love story, some neck biting in dusty libraries and a premise that everyone is going to die. I found the book at the Phuket airport and tried to resist the cheesy forbidden love plotline but succumbed to the witches and vampires context. Hey, am a sucker for the supernatural.

Witches have been given a rough time in the supernatural world. They are often portrayed as ugly, warts on face, unfashionable or comedic. Even Harry Potter, a series completely focused on Hocus Pocus, made little of witches preferring to focus on wizardry. So it is indeed refreshing to see a more 'Charmed' less 'Hermione' attitude towards these misunderstood creatures. But lets save a feminist dialogue on Harry Potter for another day and focus on Deborah Harkness's aptly titled book- A Discovery of Witches, not to be confused with the seminal work on the same subject by Matthew Hopkins even though the word play is I am sure completely intentional given Harkness's background.

Deborah wastes no time getting her teeth in as she introduces both the witch- next- door protagonist, her beguiling manuscript and her vampire lover right in chapter one. Diana Bishop comes from a long line of witches of the Bishop family, the witchy equivalent of belonging to the Vanderbilts. She is in denial of her magical abilities when she comes across a manuscript that will answer that 64 million dollar question, "Why are we here?". The problem is everyone else wants to know this answer as well and more over they believe that this confused adrenalin junkie is the key to unlocking the secrets of the manuscript. After that we get into familiar Twilight territory that involves falling in love with a cold hearted beast, meeting his family and professing love for an eternity while being kidnapped by naughty people, and finally discovering some chutzpha. Sound familiar? At one point Deborah veers so close to plotline imitation that I wonder if Ms Myer is out there somewhere sharpening her lawyers. But soon differences emerge primarily because of the literary bend to this novel as well as a tough as nails protagonist. No clumsy Bella here thank the Lord.

Harkness clearly knows her subject of alchemy and history and weaves some beautiful mythology and poetry that would bore teenagers but is music to adults. This lovely literary banter would have been perfect if not steeped in Nora Roberts predictable cheesiness. At the crux of it Ms Harkness is a history professor but not a writer of fiction. She has a commendable grasp on her subject but not on pacing. I had to often skip pages to get to the point. And yes, there is a reference to the Templars. Gasp!

The scariest witch I knew growing up.
Snow White's Step Mom

As all supernatural books, this is a three part series and the next one is due in 2012. I am curious as the plotline has indeed taken an interesting jump (pun intended) and the next book should be a fascinating history lesson on the 15th century. At the moment though I find myself reaching for Harry Potter' The Sorcerers stone, as I am yet to find someone who makes magic as fun as JK Rowling. So verdict? A must read if you are a history fan and especially one that loves the moody supernatural feel of Oxford. There is some serious mythology and poetry here to sink your teeth into and its much easier to read than Anne Rice.

Caveat : It's hard to beat Anne Rice when it comes to Vampires.

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Review | Map of the Invisible World by Tash Aw

2011-12-10T04:19:00.004+05:30

“She hurried along the final stretch until she reached the low wooden gate in front of her house. She could hear the distant ringing of her telephone as she fumbled in the dark for her keys, running across the yard. It was not until she was almost at the front door that she realised that there was someone there, a body slumped on the steps. It was a boy, a teenager, crouched over in an almost foetal position. Margaret came up close and saw that he was asleep. Disturbed by the insistent ring of the telephone, he began to stir. He shifted uncomfortably; across his white T-shirt the word BERKELEY was emblazoned in large letters. Though closed, his eyelids trembled lightly, rapidly, as if troubled by dreams.”

The book’s language is simple, scrawled across 300 odd pages that calm you despite the disquiet of the story. It’s one of the books you will find yourself quite happy to read again a few months down the line.

Set predominantly in 1960s Indonesia, Map of the Invisible World by Tash Aw is a touching story set in a very significant period in the country’s history. Strung out of different perspectives – that of a young orphan, a footloose expat, a violent communist and a lost boy—it is one of the most purging reads I’ve come across recently.

Sixteen-year-old Adam leaves his invisible island for the capital when his adopted father, Karl, a Dutch migrant, is taken away for repatriation. Here he meets Margaret, an old friend of his father’s and Din, a brilliant, but misguided young man. He also chances upon hope, loss and an enigmatic young revolutionary named Z, who saves him from the clutches of chaos. Soon, what begins as a journey to find his only family from what he calls his “new life” turns into a quest to gain closure from his “old life”, one where his older brother Johan was adopted by a wealthy couple while he watched helplessly. Set in the '60s, a troubled period of rebellion and upheaval in Indonesia, we travel through a time that teaches us about Surkarno, the New Order, Dutch colonialists and writers and painters who found their inspiration in the Invisible World of the nation’s scattered islands.

The book deals with some very complex issues but manages to keep you gripped with a story woven across time, space and missed opportunities. The characters, fluid in thought are lost and quite happily so. There are times when you get a little, ok very, teary eyed, especially when the scene shifts to Kuala Lampur, always at night, to get a glimpse of Johan – lost, guilt ridden and so full of remorse. Adam is a character you want to cherish but it’s Johan you really want to embrace.

What I love about the book is how everything feels like a memory lost in a different dimension despite its strong historic setting. I haven't read Aw's first book, The Harmony Silk Factory, but I'm definitely going to get my hands on it soon. He does not weave poetry with his words, he incites it within your senses. You can actually feel the heat in Jakarta burning the back of your neck. You can smell the sea on the island where Adam lived with Karl. You can sense the darkness in Kuala Lamur's skyline despite the sprinkles of city lights There’s beauty and terrible sadness in this book as it takes you to a time and place you might have only ever thought of as an exotic destination south east of the sun. A keeper, no doubt, and perfect to gift to a friend who is also lost, and quite happily so.

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