In 1979, Basu Chatterjee made Baaton Baaton Mein and unobtrusively brought to us the dating and courtship rituals of a community that was till then either caricatured or just overlooked in Hindi cinema. Nancy Perreira and Tony Braganza…
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Matriarchal manipulation in a patriarchal world is depicted unsparingly in Usha Priyamwada’s Pachpan Khambe Laal Deewarein (Now playing on Prasar Bharti). The mother resentful of her lecturer daughter’s comfortable life in her college residence because the younger daughters…
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“Start with hope..always start with hope. We went from being a shitty team to become one of the biggest dynasties in the sport and all it needed was one match to light this fire,” says Michael Jordan at…
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In 1947, my grandparents brought three children and the remains of an uprooted life from Pakistan to India in a train. One of those children was my mother. I grew up hearing a lot of stories about the…
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Three documentaries streaming right now show the ultimate culmination of the Bois Locker Room culture. And what happens when one gender is taught to mistrust its instincts of self-preservation and the other does not even learn something as…
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In Sudip Sharma’s Paatal Lok (Now streaming on Amazon. Co written by Sharma, Sagar Haveli, Hardik Mehta and Gunjit Chopra. Directed by Avinash Arun and Prosit Roy), India’s disowned inhabit the headlines we turn away from. A young…
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Once there was a little girl who was perfect in every way. Beautiful, smart, loving and kind. Her parents loved her until their next child arrived and then the next and the next. Before she knew it she had to grow up and take care of herself all at the age of five. And when […]
So the new year was here and you wrote your resolutions and swore to stick by them only to find yourself stuck. Stuck with the same old, same old. Many of you started making changes and then found that your enthusiasm fizzled out and some of you haven’t found enough strength to take that first […]
In our small balcony we have several flowering plants. Some have been with us for years and others we have collected during our travels and here in Florida. Amongst them is a rose plant that used to bloom bountifully, yielding sometimes 15 blossoms. Cold weather in my part of the world has stymied it. It has […]
Imagine a sea of humans in a vast expanse of darkness, A lone candle burns in the hands of one, Observing his neighbors’ unlit candles, He proceeds to share the light of his candle with them. The light grows in intensity and more shadows jump out of the darkness, Almost threatening to snuff […]
I read this book years ago and wanted to share this with you because it really jolted me out of my apathy and excessive narcissism . I hope it will inspire you to care about the less fortunate and do something for them this year. The title of the book –Leaving Microsoft to Change the World– was what […]
Time waits for no man and yet we spend our lifetimes waiting for something to come along so we can finally live our lives the way we imagined it. Time becomes our enemy, robs us of peace, health and happiness and keeps us prisoners of hope. The clock ticks on incessantly – each tick making us […]
Without light there would be no shadows. It would be total and impenetrable darkness. You might argue that brilliant light can totally obliterate shadows. But to know light one must know darkness. In a world filled with duality, we try to shy away from aspects of ourselves that are clearly dark or bad. I am […]
In the years I lived in India in my parents’ home overlooking the slums, we would see drunken husbands beating up their wives. Girls pulled out of school and sent off to do housework. Polygamous husbands and their impoverished families. I always thought it had something to do with being poor and uneducated. I was […]
Tucked away in a remote part of Uttar Pradesh, India, is a firebrand of a woman. Her name is Sampat Pal, leader of the Pink Gang (Gulabi Gang). The word gang conjures up images of mobs of unruly thugs out to create chaos. But believe me this gang is a far cry from that. Clad […]
If you are like me, then you expect to be given what you have asked for. At least that is how I imagined the wish-fulfilling department of heaven worked! You check off items on a catalogue, place an order and then wait for it to arrive within the next 30 days. I gave up the 30 day rule a […]
I’m not a black mother or a white mother. I’m just a mother. I’m not a black person or a white person. I’m just a person. With a beating heart that can break. With blood that runs through my veins. With a sense of right and wrong etched deep in my psyche. The very same […]
I have stayed positive, written in my gratitude journal, prayed every day and tried to be one with your flow. And nothing! Zilch! I know you hate it when I live in the past but I can’t help it. Just look at last year – 2012. It was nothing short of magical. You got me […]