Category: Yesterday

  • Ends & Beginnings

    A few weeks ago, I met the gentleman who was my first boss in Bangalore. We were meeting after a long time, and over a cup of coffee, he asked me for my visiting card. He looked at it for a while, and said, “I don’t know about you, but I feel very proud about this.” It was a humbling moment. He then smiled, and asked me if I remembered our interview conversation.

    Of course I did, because it was one of those occasions that changed my life’s trajectory. He reminded me that when asked why I wanted the job, I had answered “..because my future wife already has a job in Bangalore and I need to move here from Cochin to get married’. He had laughed. The year was 2003, and thus began my life in Bangalore.

    The conversation was a reason in itself for a bout of nostalgia, and as I made my way back home later in the evening, my mind was replaying the time I had spent in this city. But there was another reason too, and that’s what this post is about. (more…)

  • A long way away from home

    ‘The Global Soul’ is not my favourite Pico Iyer book (though he is a favourite anyway) mostly because I couldn’t connect to three out of its six chapters. I picked up the book because, in addition to it being a Pico book, it was about a subject that has fascinated me for a while now – the concept of ‘home’. This, in a multicultural world whose corporate citizens are rapidly making sure that ‘Everywhere is made up of everywhere else..’ I remember writing about this almost three years ago, in the context of another travel book and my visit to what I still consider home – Cochin. It was evoked by the presence of the same brands that I might see in a mall in Bangalore, the disappearance of familiar landmarks, and the residents referring to new landmarks that I really didn’t know of. It is perhaps unfair to expect that even as I changed, the idea of home would remain a constant. Maybe I will get used to that in a while too.

    I had wondered whether, in our pursuit of convenience and familiarity, we might end up creating a homogeneous world. Now I wonder if we might be one of the last generations to live in a truly heterogeneous world, as, in addition to the corporate imperialism, culture also becomes the most exported and imported product, courtesy technological advances – real and virtual. Home is, as the t-shirt goes, where the wifi connects automatically, and I’d be able to recreate it anywhere, with all the props made available to me.

    Every year, around this time, there is usually a home visit, and I would be chronicling it, this year there isn’t. Our regular visit targets are missing in action, and going there doesn’t make sense. I wonder if this is how it begins, and a couple of decades later, when I’m traveling, a bout of homesickness would hit me, and I would realise that it wasn’t Cochin I was thinking of. I’ll probably feel sad then, and guilty. But for now, I am closing my eyes, and recreating Cochin in my mind, with no props. I am able to, I can sense the wistfulness as I walk through the streets (without Google) and they haven’t changed. It’s heartening to know that while I have left Cochin, it hasn’t left me.

    picoiyersrilankaimg_0140

    until next time, homegrown can be grown?

  • Time Vault

    bottle3

    This was my ‘water bottle’ at Myntra, and the victim of many of my colleagues’ jokes, mostly thanks to its size. It is really tiny, and you could finish all the water in it in one gulp. It has been disfigured many a time, courtesy its battles with hot water. But it bears its scars with dignity, even though it wobbles a bit. It also seems to have a fair amount of stature, since at least three of my colleagues asked me if they could take the bottle after I left. I refused, but now that I’m ready to join the new workplace, I don’t know if I should use it anymore. But I don’t want to throw it away either, since it holds a lot of memories and in future, will probably be the only unchanged remnant of some good times. I wish I could store it somewhere, but I’m also trying to get rid of my hoarding habit!

    That’s what led me to think of this concept – since we’re in the era of 3D scanning and 3D printing, theoretically it should be possible to construct a 3D scan of the bottle with its basic dimensions, exact contours, texture of material etc and store it. I should then be able to print out an exact replica using a 3D printer. These technologies are not yet mainstream, but I’m wondering if this could be a way of storing memories. We can store images, text, sounds easily now but not smell, taste and touch. This could at least take care of the touch aspect.

    At some point in the future, I’m hoping if it’ll be possible to store such treasures as a file and print them out whenever I feel like it. An entire folder full of memories – of different times in my lives, that I can easily bring to life. It would be like a time vault. Vault as a noun -storehouse – and vault as a verb – leaping, in this case across time thanks to ‘physical’ memories. Maybe, in the future, we could live in the past for a day, and come back.

    until next time, the future of memories

  • Movie magic

    There’s a new wave of movies in Malayalam which have now gotten a genre all to themselves – they are being called ‘new generation’. This has as much to do with the new breed of filmmakers/actors/technicians who’ve begun to make their mark as it is to do with the themes that are portrayed in these films and the mindset that a viewer has to probably adopt – this mindset being radically different from the one reserved for the standard potboiler fare that viewers were used to. I stress the last two because it isn’t as though these kind of movies had never been made before. It was just that they were very few in number. Simply put, the maker and viewer generations are now showing a radical shift from even say, 2-3 years back – in terms of approach, outlook, perspectives, perceptions and expectations.

    Movies being a medium of expression, I have always been intrigued by the subtexts, though I have not had the liberty of time to actually spend thoughts on the subject.  This article, for instance, does a good analysis on Mani Ratnam’s movies and the influence of various narratives. These days, when I watch (malayalam) movies from the 80s and 90s,  I try to identify the themes that have been used in/inspired them. Earlier than that would be difficult since I have no primary experience of the era.

    I saw Thoovanathumbikal again recently, a fantastic movie which deserves a ‘new generation’ tag even if it were made now, especially because of its sensibilities. It is very much what I call a mood movie – requires the viewer to succumb to the mood to truly enjoy it, especially the current day viewer who expects something to happen every second, and nuances are not counted. (probably why Annayum Rasoolum was not appreciated much – it’s less to do with the theme and its twists and more about the way it’s been dealt with – the sophistication and the aesthetic) Timeless as Thoovanathumbikal might be, I wonder how much one would appreciate it more if one had experienced first hand the societal values, mindset  and the ethos of the time. The rain, for example, which plays such an important part, do we view it in that light anymore? At the same time, the maturity of the person is also a factor. I was nine when it released and would have slept through it! 🙂

    And that’s probably why cinema is indeed magical – not only is it a representation of an era, or a part of it, but at any point in time, there’d be someone who’d be able to relate to it, across the passage of years.

    until next time, moving pictures

  • Of fame and purpose

    I completely missed Bigg Boss 6. Except for knowing that the arrested-for-sedition cartoonist and Sapna Bhavnani were participants, my exposure to it was limited to lunch conversations at office, where two of my friends seemed to be avid followers. 🙂 I thought my ignorance was only fair, since they are usually clueless when I mention the names of micro-celebrities on Twitter.

    Increasingly, I am realising that popular culture is going through massive fragmentation. The above was an example. I think this generation is connected with more people than any before it. It has always been so, with better means of communication, but this time, it has been an explosion. We’re still coping with the overload, or filter-failure, as Clay Shirky calls it. Despite social networks, or probably because of them and their algorithms, we miss out on many things.

    I was thinking of all this in the context of fame. Fame, to me, has some connection with my favourite subject these days – purpose. Fame can serve as a means, or end, or a by product of purpose. The thing is, with the fragmentation I mentioned earlier, fame probably has to be redefined, also because its shelf life has been drastically reduced. Once upon a time, a name/photo appearing in a newspaper was an achievement. (let’s ignore the notoriety piece 🙂 ) Later, before channels mushroomed, it was television. But now….

    One of the things that might happen because of all this is the gradual de-linking of fame and purpose, if it does exist. I’m still trying to figure out how that will shift our perspectives on purpose.

    until next time, being famous ain’t what it used to be…