She and I

We’ve been together 5 years but most of the time we’re yelling, crying, or fighting with each other. We kiss and make up as quickly as we fall out, but the scars remain. We’ve talked about ending it for good, but each time we stare at each other and say nothing, we realize we could…

You and Your Editor

I slipped in to an astro-turfed rooftop of a fancy new restaurant in south Delhi, pretending I was fashionably late. I offered the onlookers who threw me the death stare a complimentary pageant girl wave. The show may begin. Two women sat on plush couches with floor lamps you’d buy at the fake vintage shop down…

Body

I’ve always loved the beginnings of things. Standing on the precipice of something old and mundane, gazing out into the blissful unknown, digging my toes into the ground and waiting for the right moment to take off. The beginnings of things. Where my heart is nervous, and excited, and challenged, and intrigued. Where my mind…

choochoo

Enveloped in the still of a black night, we chug along through breathtaking beauty. Blindly. Sticky shoulders bumping, eyes darting, jumping, resting. The white of a tube light rolls in and out of my rectangular peep hole. A smell eludes my thoughts…oils. Masalas. I watch as a young woman banters with her friend. Inimitably, cleverly,…

guest post: one down in the bribe tribe

Fortunately, one of the calls to the police had gone through and the swat team stormed in within two minutes although these were the longest 2 minutes of my life. Ironically, it was the concern and anxiety of a senior officer from the Lokayukt who was calling the team to monitor progress that was keeping the critical phone line busy!
Like trained commandos, every member of the crack team got busy in something — video-graphing evidence, detecting traces of the powder, searching the office for cash, removal of cameras from my body and analysis of the recordings. Two hours later Khan and the typist were formally under arrest being led out of the building into the waiting police van.

water

The glee continued to surprise and delight me as its honesty and unfiltered exhilaration persisted throughout the following few days. Seeing someone so absolutely thrilled with the mere sight of water is like watching a baby take her first steps. Trepidation, sincerity, discovery, euphoria. I tried to capture a moment in which I had felt that way in the near past and was left empty handed. Had my maturity washed away my innocence and unabashed appreciation for the simplest of things in life, abandoning me for what I like to call ‘wit and class’?

it's all about the people

The kind of people who care about other people for the sake of benefiting their lives solely seem to be unaffected by the presence and absence of money. They walk on water unattached to material things. They are unmoved by the silly little things that seem to guide the rest of our lives.