Accidental Blogger
A general interest blog
Category: Educational, Cultural & Social Matters
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Last Saturday, I attended the first wedding anniversary of a former student of mine, Parvati, and her husband, Bahadur. Circumstances, a year ago, did not allow for a proper wedding party, so throwing a party on their first wedding anniversary seemed a very good idea. It was.
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“Nahoum and Sons bakery is part of the Calcutta of my childhood. It still has all the goodies I loved as a boy, like brownies, macaroons and plum cake….[T]he decor has not changed since 1911. What I never knew as a boy was that Nahoum was a kosher bakery….[O]nce it made a lot of Jewish…
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Matthew Stewart, author- philosopher- business manager, explains: During the seven years that I worked as a management consultant, I spent a lot of time trying to look older than I was. I became pretty good at furrowing my brow and putting on somber expressions. Those who saw through my disguise assumed I made up for…
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“According to a new biography by Joseph Lelyveld, the love of Mahatma Gandhi’s life was a German-Jewish bodybuilder named Hermann Kallenbach. “Your portrait (the only one) stands on my mantelpiece in my bedroom,” Gandhi wrote to Kallenbach. “The mantelpiece is opposite to the bed.””
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I did not understand the objection to the idea that India is cut from whole cloth. Americans knew India through the movies. The plots, landscapes, costumes, and characters were all the same derivative of Kipling and the high achievement of Victoria’s empire. There was only one India, and only one experience.
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It seems there is an overabundance of books about India in the market; writers, native as well as foreign born, are weighing in. While some of the publications are about India's history and politics, others deal with the more amorphous concept of "India as an experience" which of course, must deal with the country's history but may also contain a generous dose…
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There's a new biography out on Gandhi. It's true that the longer the time duration elapsed from a historical event, the clearer the eyes are that look back at the event. This book appears to be no exception. From the NY Times review: "He made a host of enemies along the way — orthodox Hindus…
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A long time ago, in a coffee shop far, far away (a now defunct Diedrich's in Brea, CA), I had the good fortune of befriending one of the baristas, a young Chapman University film student and musician. Steve had taken an interest in a music magazine I was reading. (I still subscribe to the magazine,…
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A Few Thoughts on the Natural Disaster in Japan (Norman Costa) I was commenting on Ruchira's post "Are the Japanese culturally better equipped to handle catastrophes?" It was getting a bit long, so I thought I would make a separate post. I spent a little time in Tokyo on business trips from Hong Kong where…
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The extremely orderly, law abiding and co-operative culture of Japan, as also its long history of living with natural (and one major man-made one during WWII) disasters may have given rise to a mindset capable of dealing with catastrophes with calm. The recent scenes of public order amidst natural chaos from areas of Japan devastated by the massive earthquake…
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Some thoughts and stories about what is arguably the largest inequality remaining in the world: the sexual intimidation of women. This piece wasn’t written specifically for International Women’s Day, but the coincidence in timing is certainly appropriate. 7:12. Shit. Her body released a milligram of adrenaline, enough to force her heart to pound uncomfortably and…
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Razib has a post up on brown pundits and it mentions some Hindu doctor giving his new-agish views about evolution in Hinduism. Any comments?
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Razib Khan, the indefatigable science blogger and social / cultural commentator (who occasionally drops by here) is featured in the New York Times as a rare bird – a political conservative who is also an atheist. As a child, Razib Khan spent several weeks studying in a Bangladeshi madrasa. Heather Mac Donald once studied literary deconstructionism and clerked for a left-wing judge.…
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What is assumed by many is that The Merchant of Venice is dramatic tragedy. With this assumption it may seem that love and romance and out of place; or it could be the other way around, with a capital trial being out of place, and coming just before ‘boy meets girl.’ But it is not…
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Eulogy to be delivered upon the ASSASSINATION and burial of Frances Fox Pivens: (Norman Costa) Friends, Americans, countrymen, listen to me; I come to bury Frances Fox Pivens, not to praise her; The evil that women do lives after them, The good is often interred with their bones, So let it be with Pivens … The noble Glenn Beck Has…
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