The airport is a big surprise. It is not the ram shackled, worn-out airport in which I landed 10 years ago. Then Hyderabad had no direct flight to Patna. I had to change flights in New Delhi. Now the flying experience is smooth and coordinated.
After a hiatus of nearly 7 years I travelled in an unreserved train compartment recently from Nellore to Vijayawada. Travel in a reserved air conditioned coach is a sanitised experience where order and protocol is enforced on an otherwise chaotic Indian railway carriage. Also boundaries of class because of the higher cost of the travel create barriers of access. A group of Bhavanis boarded the compartment along with me.
At India’s southern edge, sea, memory, faith and travel merge as Krishna Mohan moves through Kanniyakumari and Trivandrum, searching for what makes a place stay with us.
Being an officer in the A.P. administrative machinery, I had the opportunity to visit all the districts of united A.P. except Adilabad. Although I have worked mostly in the coastal districts, I could visit all the districts in Telangana for some inspection or the other. In my 27 years of service in the welfare departments only Adilabad district had remained out of bounds for me.
For a long time I had wanted to visit Kolkata, a city about which I have read a lot, heard and thought a lot. From the writings of Rabindranath Tagore, Bibhuti Bhushan, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Sarat Chandra, from the films of Satyajit Ray, Shyam Benegal, Ritwik Ghatak, Mrinal Sen, Aparna Sen i had a few notions in my head. I have been an ardent admirer of the intellectual spirit of this city. Bengal; the cradle of Indian renaissance, the land of pioneering reform, the place from where the flames of freedom fanned across India, the land of intellectuals, reformers and patriots, I wanted to be
It is welcome to be having a feeling of déjà vu now and then. After my childhood of 2 years in Cochin some 50 years ago, I could visit Kerala again. It is Sun and rain which alternate in nearly symmetrical patterns that make me enthusiastic. Far from a land that knows only one season, Summer; I’m in Kerala at that time of the year when the monsoon is active.
Being a denizen of Nellore I have had a great fascination for the river Godavari. This mighty and beautiful river which had been extolled so much in Telugu Literature and inspired many poets and artists to weave magical words and images about it was nearly unknown, because I did not get an opportunity to see it until after my 25th year. My first impression of the Godavari was when I had to attend the wedding of one of my friends in Rajahmundry. The mighty, majestic views of this river as it rolled serenely towards its confluence with the ocean on that misty morning as the
The proper subject of tragedy is very hard to decide, but invariably being a tragedy means having to do something with the darker side of life. The sorrowful, the dreadful, the fearful and the gory thus find their legitimate place in tragedy. Hamlet is said to be the most intriguing of all Shakespeare’s tragedies. Othello…
Of all the literary genres that one becomes familiar with as a student of Literature, it is the novel which is impactful because of its presence and dominance. One cannot diminish the importance of other modes of literary expression just because one fancies the Novel but the truth is that the novel has overwhelmed the…
Varanasi being in the news again, I went down memory lane and refreshed my visit to this eternal city in January 2013. This is more in the form of a travelogue and will be in varying tenses. “I’m travelling to Varanasi by the Ganga Kaveri express. Dry and deserted rural Maharashtra – Men in Dhotis and women too in Dhoti styled saris.