December 13, 2011
The two Malayalee nurses who helped rescue 8 patients in the Kolkata hospital fire, before succumbing themselves, were given a funeral with state honors yesterday. Remarkable individuals. Undeniably, despite the utterly despicable nature of majority of the wealthy and the powerful in this land, the billion strong population ensures that there are at least a few million selfless dedicated souls who form sparks of hope in times of despair and resignation.
Cartoonist Mario Miranda passed away. His exceptional style of drawing and unique sense of humor was great amusement source for me while growing up; my most common source being the Femina magazines that Amma used to bring home from her office library. I remember that "Miss Fonseca" was the answer to a quiz hosted by Derek O'Brien at the Institute of Engineer's Hall in the early 90s. Most of the teams had wrongly answered it as "Miss Rajini Nimbupani". Both unforgettable, curvy characters created by the master!
I have slowed down in my progress with Tavernier as I am making up lost time with the Mahabharatha. In his third volume, Tavernier dedicates the first chapter to the main products of India: cotton, indigo, jewelry and so on. Immediately next, he has a chapter that lists how Indian craftsmen and traders commit fraud in each of those items, listing them in the same order as the previous chapter.
Kairali TV has a show called "Ente Pusthakam" (My book) in which the guests reveal their favorite books. Today, the speaker of the state legislative assembly, G. Karthikeyan, revealed that M.T.Vasudevan Nair's "Randamoozham" which narrates the Mahabharatha from Bhima's perspective, was his favorite. The program showed the original drawings by artist Namboothiri that accompanied the novel when it appeared serialized in the Mathrubhumi magazine decades ago. One was the sketch of Bhima with Hidumbi, his Rakshasi(demoness) wife.
Coincidentally, I was reading this Hidumbi episode in the epic today. I wonder why Vyasa thought it important to mention specifically that the demons had 8 teeth (with which they use to tear up human flesh and enjoy it). May be I am focusing too much on the numbers that are dropped intermittently in the epic. An idle mind is a conspiracy theorist's workshop.
The Higgs boson seminar is underway at the LHC as I type this. Lot of anticipation among the physicists, both the real and the pop ones! Though the boson discovery is not going to make any change in my life, reading and listening about it, at least it takes my mind away from the possible lack of tap water for next couple of days...
The International Film Festival of Kerala has been marred by incidents of mismanagement and loud protests. Couple of times, audience thronged theaters, overflowing into the aisles, expecting the movie to be "spicy" based on their reading of the brochure. Over the weekend, the director of Turkish movie named 'Vucut' (i.e Body-genius titling!), was amused to see the packed theater for its screening. Yesterday the volunteer usher at Remya theater was beaten up by impatient spectators who were told that the show of movie titled "Three" (with its suggestive 'sandwich' poster) was already houseful!
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