One Liner

While driving back to Delhi on a recent trip to Jaipur, read this one liner written behind a truck

बुरी नज़र वाले पाकिस्तान चला जा 

Although we all must have read more funnier (or strange) ones behind trucks but this was one was unique for me. Haven't read something like this till now - why the hell are we getting our neighbors into this. They have their own set of problems, so let them be alone. :)

Sometimes, I do think that people should do research on some of the things which are unexplained till now. One of them is the 'Origin and History of One Liners written behind Trucks'. I also wonder whether such a thing happens only in India or is this a phenomenon in other countries as well.

"Malgudi Days" By R.K. Narayan

Nearly everyone of us (from my generation) would never forget the "Malgudi Days" we used to watch on the television in our childhood. That title music still lingers on our lips. To hear the tune, click here. Well, the serial was based on a wonderfully written collection of short stories from one of India's greatest novelist, R.K. Narayan.

It is a collection of short stories written by the author (around 32 in number) which are based in a fictional South Indian town of Malgudi. The fiction town of Malgudi has been imagined and described in such a form that it could be any town of India. The vast majority of the stories are less than ten pages long; several are under five; and only one is more than 20. Narayan wrote many of these stories under deadline, within the limits of word count and column length for The Hindu, a Madras newspaper for which Narayan had a contract for a weekly submission beginning in 1939. At the same time they all seem spontaneously and effortlessly composed. Each stands on its own, but they are inherently intertwined while remaining independent from each other. The only force binding them is the town of Malgudi.

The main characters in each of the short story is a real life character - be it a school boy, a retired old man, a gardener, a maid, post man, snake charmer, cobbler, a gateman or even a dog. They all seem so familiar (especially for people like me who were born and raised up in a small city - not a metro); they are people from every walk of life. In nearly all the stories, the description of Malgudi is very real-like - you can actually imagines its market place, its school, its main roads and other things while reading the stories.

Here are some of the best stories from the lot:-

Attila: Attila is a small pup in a family who is bought with the expectation that he will grow up to fierce and protector of the house, after all he has the right pedigree. He turns out to be the friendliest dog in the world and when a thief enters the house he turns protector in most unexpected fashion.

Leela’s Friend: Sidda works as a domestic help in an affluent household. His main task is to play with the daughter of the household, Leela, who is just a small girl. Leela is very fond of Sidda. One day her gold chain goes missing and Sidda is accused and handed over to the police. The chain is found later on.

Iswaran: In India, we seem to have very little tolerance for failure and Iswaran flunks his 12th board examinations more than once. He seems not to care and develops a tough exterior. This story rings true for many Indian youngsters even today.

Lawely Road: Lawely Road pokes gentle fun on the fixation of changing names of everything British after India got independence. In this story, the municipality wants to pull down a statue of Sir. F. Lawely with hilarious consequences.

Father’s Help: Swami (a small child studying in first standard) develops an headache in the morning just before school. Father is adamant that Swami has to attend school. Swami tells tales to father that his class teacher Samuel has a fascination of skinning people alive. Father writes a strong letter to the Headmaster of the school and Swami has to deliver it. The dilemma Swami then faces makes this story the best one.

A must read classic in my opinion.

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

Whats great about this book is that it will change the way you look at things. Economics, for me, has never been my cup of tea. It is a science much bigger than reaching to Mars, I think. But this book is made for people like me. It is fun reading, all the while using data mining, to prove why things happen as they happen in terms of economics.

"Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything" is a book by Steven Levitt (University Of Chicago) and Stephen J. Dubner (New York Times). It proves that economics is not dull all time and not all related to finances most of the times. The book's topics include:
Chapter 1: Discovering cheating as applied to teachers and sumo wrestlers (See below)
Chapter 2: Information control as applied to the Ku Klux Klan and real-estate agents
Chapter 3: The economics of drug dealing, including the surprisingly low earnings and abject working conditions of crack cocaine dealers
Chapter 4: The controversial role legalized abortion has played in reducing crime
Chapter 5: The negligible effects of good parenting on education
Chapter 6: The socioeconomic patterns of naming children

Authors ask a lot of hilarious questions like: If drug dealers make so much money, why do they still live with their mothers? or Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? or Do real estate agents have their clients’ best interests at heart? or What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? or How did the legalization of abortion affect the rate of violent crime?

The book was first published in 2005 and was a best seller, selling more than 3 million copies till now in around 30 languages. For many people, this book is an absurd book. But for me, this has been a "aha" effect book - nice one time read. Wonderful way of looking at things - it surely turns conventional wisdom on its head.

For more, have a look the book's official site.

Book Review: "Notes From A Small Island" By Bill Bryson

Notes From A Small Island is a travelogue by Bill Bryson about his farewell journey through England, Wales and Scotland before leaving for U.S. so that to "give his children the opportunity to live in another country, his wife the ability to go shopping after 10 P.M., and rescue Americans from the delusion that they were being abducted by aliens" (all is his own words). He travels through his adopted homeland by rail, bus or foot and captures, as usual, the details wherever he goes.

The best part about Bill Bryson is his eye for detail and his laugh-out-loud humor. This book has the details part intact but the laugh-out-loud factor is somewhat subdued. If you are truly a Bill Bryson fan, you will be a little disappointed by this one - at least I was. The book is more about his experiences rather than the history, people and other local things for the places he visits. Also, the second part of the book goes rather boring with his same type of rant about hotels he stays in, strange place names, identical places etc. Maybe it is because, as he says, there is everything identical in all the British places.

Overall, single time read. Not as good as "Walk in the Woods" or "Down Under" but still it has its own moments.

Book Review: "Transmission" By Hari Kunzru

Hari Kunzru's Transmission is a wonderful, witty yet thoughtful fictional novel about an Indian programmer who dreams of working in US, gets the opportunity, but finds it hard to survive there. It is a story about a computer virus, the man behind it and its effect on the global economy. It is also a satire on American culture and its technology dependence by means of the main protagonist's journey as well as other characters.

The main protagonist, Arjun Mehta, is a computer programmer & bollywood movie buff, who lands into his dream - working in Silicon Valley. But once he reaches there, he realizes that the reality is very different from the dream. His job is not what he desired and working is part time. Living in near poverty, he lands into a job at an antivirus company. When job cuts in the company threaten his job as well, he devises a plan - to create a virus named after his favorite bollywood actress, unleash it on internet and then become a hero by finding a "cure" for it. Unfortunately, he can't, and the things go out of his hand - the virus threatens the whole world economy and brings a lot of disgrace for his favorite bollywood actress as well.

Although the characters are shallow and the focus is more on their plight as well as satire over American culture, I feel this book is worth a read. Not as good as "The Impressionist" but still readable - easy read and funny.

Book Review: "Neither Here Nor There: Travels In Europe" By Bill Bryson

In this book, Bill Bryson attempts to recreate the travel itinerary of his youth some seventeen years earlier when he backpacked across Europe with one of his high school friend; He is alone this time with rucksack and notebook. This book a mixture of his lively anecdotes, sharp observations, and flashbacks to his earlier tour.

The book covers Norway (Hammerfest, Oslo), France (Paris), Belgium (Brussels, Bruges, Spa, Durbuy), Germany (Aachen, Cologne, Hamburg), Holland (Amsterdam), Denmark (Copenhagen), Sweden (Gothenburg, Stockholm), Italy (Rome, Naples, Sorrento, Capri, Florence, Milan, Como), Switzerland (Brig, Geneva, Bern), Liechtenstein, Austria (Innsbruck, Salzburg, Vienna), Yugoslavia (Split, Sarajevo, Belgrade), Bulgaria (Sofia), and Turkey (Istanbul).

The book is pure entertainment (provided you must not fail to catch the humor there). He is quite honest about what he liked or what he did not liked. And he was prompt is downgrading his rating for a "well-known" place once he reached there and did not found it up to the mark. He also diligently lavishes praises on lesser known places. He surely avoids the usual travel writer obligation to adore every place (read famous places) they visit.

I know that some of you may find this book rather strangely funny - or, even absurd at times. But only if you're obsessed with political correctness, he may offend you, but he is democratic in his targets. He has some quite interesting observations to make. Although most of the observations are now out of the date (he wrote the book in 1990) but they are funny and a refreshing change from the breathless romanticism of so many guidebooks and travel brochures. He also shows that Europe and Britain aren't as perfect as they look from the windows of a tour bus.

Book Review: In Xanadu - A Quest by William Dalrymple

Most of us must have heard following opening lines of a poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge:

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

The poem references Mongol and Chinese emperor Kublai Khan of the Yuan dynasty and his summer capital Xanadu or Shangdu (as popularly known). Xanadu has a significant place in western history as well because it was the destination of the most famous Marco Polo's trip from Jerusalem to China (which he called Cathay) carrying oil from Holy Sepulcher & presents from Pope Gregory X for Kublai Khan between 1271 & 1274.

In his book by name of 'In Xanadu - A Quest', William Dalrymple retraces the epic journey of Marco Polo from Jerusalem to Xanadu, the ruins of the palace of Kubla Khan, north of Peking carrying oil from Holy Sepulcher, in the summer of 1986. He calls this book as a quest - not a vacation - just because it involves hardship and suffering not accompanied by a vacation. An intrepid traveler, and entertaining writer, Dalrymple offers an anecdotal history of the people and places he encounters en route through Israel, Cyprus, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Pakistan, and the breadth of China. An overland passage through these closed countries is an incredible travel feat in itself.

Although I did not found this book to be as engrossing or interesting as some of the other ones by William Dalrymple. But still, this is not a great book; it is an interesting book. Much of the book is the usual stuff of travel: difficulties in getting official clearance; locals speaking funny (read faulty) English; stomach upsets due to eating strange food at various roadside eateries; staying at inns which are sometimes as dirty as roads outside; and so on. However, in some sections he writes about more interesting things like how dull Polo's own account really is, developments in Islamic architecture, the history of some of the places, recognizing Marco's Polo description of a place and mapping it into current state of affairs. In totality, an interesting enough book by a 22 year old (remember this was his first book).

Read this book if:
1. You love reading travel books which are not like essays.
2. You are on a vacation which has turned wrong - in this book you will find that it could have been worse :)

Book Review: "Shakespeare By Bill Bryson"

I am not a great reader of biographies (or that too from Jacobean or Elizabethan literature) but I just finished a new book by Bill Bryson (and you say - but Bill Bryson is not about bioraphies). Yes, you are true - but this book is about a prominent figure from that era. The book surprisingly is not a travel book (oh thank god, I would not have to laugh-holding-my-stomach-till-I-cry a lot like I do while reading this travel books) but a biography of Shakespeare.

It is a very clean book - it actually does not gives its own theories about many mysterious facts of Shakespeare's life; but just tries to be itself. It is author's attempt to decode more of what Shakespeare was as a human being not as a writer. He traces William Shakespeare journey from Startford-upon-Avon to London (in Lord Chamberlain's Men) and then back to Startford-upon-Avon, where he died in 1616.

Bill Bryson highlights the major feature of Shakespeare's life (or whatever we know of him) - scant facts as we know. For example, it is rather strange to know that for nearly eight years of his life - nobody knows where Shakespeare was - before he actually surfaced as one of the most prominent play writer in London. Or, that there are hardly a dozen writings of Shakespeare in his own hand writing - and half of them are his signatures - each one different from another. And there is not a single painting of William Shakespeare in which we can say for sure how did he looked like - or even if the guy in the painting is indeed Shakespeare. Few records of Shakespeare's life survive, and there has been considerable speculation about matters such as his sexuality (just because he wrote a rather risque poem dedicated to an Earl & some sonnets of intense friendship), religious beliefs (just because it was so confusion out there at that time in general) and whether the works attributed to him were written by someone else (this is height of... !!). Bryson documents the efforts of different scholars (some bizarre and others more bizarre) - where each one tried to prove a point about Shakespeare's life. Consider this, an eccentric Delia Bacon, who developed a firm but 'unconvincing' (read "no proof") conviction that, Francis Bacon, was the true author of Shakespeare's plays.

Emulating the style of his famous travelogues, Bryson records episodes in his research, including a visit to a bunker like room in Washington, D.C., where the world's largest collection of First Folios is housed. Bryson celebrates the great era of English literature & London play circuits with facts rather then defining them on speculations. Bryson also points out that we know so little about Shakespeare because till hundred years after his death there was no serious attempt to write about his life - was it because he was not so popular at that time?

Overall, a nice read if
1. You love to read about history.
2. You love to read Bill Bryson, which I do.
3. You can imagine Jacobean or Elizabethan era and its descriptions.