When I go back home on holiday, my morning routine is to fix myself a cup of tea and head down to the garden with a newspaper. I spend about an hour leisurely sipping a hot cuppa and reading the paper from cover to cover (well, almost!). Every time I return back, I promise myself that I will get up earlier so that I can read at least the headlines and a couple of stories before I rush off to work. But, I’m a late sleeper and a late riser, and reading the newspaper is something that I just cannot fit in to my morning rush to get to work. I used to try to get onto a newspaper website before I started the day at office so I was not totally oblivious to the world around me, but that didn’t always happen.
Then, I bought my iPhone and was initiated into the world of apps. The New York Times (NYT), Hindustan Times and NDTV were among the first few apps I downloaded. Of these, the NYT app is my absolute favorite. The headlines and the entire news story are downloaded when you start the app, and you can read them whenever you have a few moments to spare. I generally download the news as I run around getting ready, and then quickly scan through interesting news stories whenever I am stuck in traffic. You just gotta love technology, right?
Given our increasingly busy lifestyles and the proliferation of the internet and smartphones, it’s no wonder that newspapers (especially in the US) are seeing subscriber numbers fall. To deal with the loss of subscribers and declining ad sales, a few publishers are once again putting their online content behind a pay wall. The NYT has started asking users to pay up if they want unlimited access to digital content, and News Corp. put so much faith in the proliferation of content on tablets and on the success of Apple’s offering that it launched an iPad only subscription news magazine The Daily.
Are these moves warranted? Recent figures seem to say yes.
Paid subscriptions to read News Corp’s Wall Street Journal on tablets (Kindle, Nook, iPad and Android tablets) quadrupled to 200,000 in 2010 from about 50,000 a year ago. Though this may be a very small figure compared to the 1.6 million print copies that are circulated each day, it is a huge leap forward, and may well be the start of a brand new trend. Who knows, the day might come when people will have to go a museum to see what a printed newspaper looked like!
What’s your take? Do you prefer to read a newspaper the old fashioned way, or have you moved online?
Recently, I’ve been reading books and watching movies related to women’s rights (or lack thereof) and their suppression by the men in their family. It wasn’t a conscious choice, it’s just something that happened by chance. It started with Elizabeth Gilbert’s Committed, in which she devotes almost an entire chapter to marriages of convenience in the 1930s. Such marriages were very prevalent in India even until a decade ago – and still are in a number of communities. These are marriages between families, where oftentimes the woman isn’t really given much choice in the matter. The men, of course, can choose – and that choice was almost always based on something as transient as looks. In Margaret Atwood’s The Blind Assassin, the main protagonist, Iris, was married off to industrialist Richard Griffin to save her family’s factories. The novel follows her disastrous marriage and the sexual abuse her sister suffered at the hands of her husband. Both of these books present the plight of the woman as a thing of the past, but not Bol. This is a bold movie to have come out of Pakistan recently, and highlights the plight of women, who are subjected to the tyranny of the male head of the house, in the present day. The movie deals with a number of important issues in that country – birth control, discrimination against gays, and the lack of choice for women. Some would think these issues are currently faced mainly by developing countries. They would be wrong.
As I read The Men Behind The War on Women on Huffington Post recently, I was shocked and enraged at the blatant disregard displayed by The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops with regard to women’s reproductive health.
“Over the past two years the GOP-controlled House of Representatives has launched one of the most extreme assaults on women’s choice the U.S. has seen in decades. Republicans voted twice to slash federal family planning funds for low-income women, moved to prevent women from using their own money to buy insurance plans that cover abortion, introduced legislation that would force women to have ultrasounds before receiving an abortion and, most recently, passed a bill that will allow hospitals to refuse to perform emergency abortions for women with life-threatening pregnancy complications. But the erosion of women’s rights didn’t begin with the GOP takeover…Lift the curtain, and behind the assault was the conference of bishops.”
Abortion stops a beating heart (Image by wht_wolf9653 via Flickr)
As if this weren’t enough, the Catholic Bishops have now launched a high-intensity campaign against birth control. Yes. Against.
I thought it was only the poor and uneducated lot who still thought that birth control was a direct affront to the heavens and that once married, women were supposed to set up a baby production factory. Apparently, I was wrong. The church, of course, has always been anti-abortion, but to take away choice from women, even in the case of rape, incest or complications and potential danger to the mother’s life, is barbaric.
The bishops are now lobbying against The Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) insurance coverage guidelines stating that all health plans under the Affordable Care Act cover birth control at no cost for women. Although the rules offer religious exemption to churches, Catholic-affiliated organizations such as charities and hospitals would still have to cover birth control for their employees.
Arguing that the exemption is too narrow, the bishops want the Obama administration to either entirely remove the coverage of birth control or to offer an exemption to all Catholic organizations. This would mean that thousands of women who work for these organizations, even if they are not themselves Catholic, would be denied the preventative health coverage options available to most other women in the US.
HQ of the HHS
If you thought the bishops were lobbying for these measures only on religious grounds, you would be wrong. They’re fighting because of the large sums of money at stake. The HHS recently dropped the bishops from a five-year, $19 million contract to help victims of sexual trafficking. The bishops think they were dropped because they do not offer victims the full range of contraceptive and gynecological services, such as abortion referrals, birth control pills and condoms, provided by other agencies.
At the end of the day, then, it is the lure of money that is going to strip women of their rights and choice when it comes to their personal reproductive health and even their life.
Bishop William Lori defends the bishops’ actions thus: “We recognize that not everybody shares that teaching; nevertheless, it is a fundamental right for the church to stand by their convictions.” Doesn’t this reek of duplicity? By forcing legislation that will deny birth control and abortion to millions of women, the bishops are effectively imposing their views on the fundamental rights of individuals.
What’s probably worse, though, is that this isn’t the only legislation in question. Women across US states have lost major ground this year. Already, about 80 measures have been enacted to restrict access to abortion, all of which violate international human rights standards. These include Ohio’s ban on abortion once a heartbeat can be detected (6–10 weeks’ gestation); and a state ballot initiative in Mississippi, which if passed, would mandate personhood from the moment of fertilization. This could potentially outlaw the most popular forms of contraception; would treat destroyed eggs as murder victims, essentially making abortion illegal; and would prohibit scientists from destroying embryos created in laboratories, a process that is often required during in vitro fertilization and scientific research.
No matter what your individual stand on abortion might be, most of these measures go against a number of commonly accepted reproductive and human rights. Indeed, as the world moves towards decriminalizing abortion, one of the most developed nations is effectively muzzling women’s right to choice.
So begins The Storyteller of Marrakesh. This literary mystery is narrated by Hassan, who belongs to a family of traditional storytellers. He has set up his kilim (blanket) in the Jemma el Fna and is preparing to tell a story
…the like of which I promise you have never heard before. It is a love story, like all the best stories, but it is also a mystery, for it concerns the disappearance of one of the lovers or the other or perhaps both of them or neither.
And so Hassan begins weaving his tale, one which he feels compelled to retell once a year. The story revolves around Lucia, a half American half French woman and her Indian lover. It revolves around his brother Mustafa, who fell in love with Lucia, and then, a week after the disappearance of the tourists, turned himself in to the police in connection with their disappearance. It revolves around the day those tourists spent at the Jemma and around all of those who came in contact with them. It revolves around her beauty and the passions that it ignited in all the men who had the fortune, or misfortune, to meet her that day.
Jemma el Fna square by night Image via Wikipedia
There is a story within a story within a story, with all the listeners present invited to come forward and talk about their meeting with the foreigners that day. Through the collective memories of all who are gathered around Hassan, and all of whom were at the Jemma on that day, emerges a narrative of the various sightings of this mysterious couple. There are premonitions, superstitions, and men driven mad with desire for the girl. Through the stories, you get a glimpse of the Jemma, of the heady world of Marrakesh and an insight into traditional Islamic culture.
The many narratives weave together into an intricate mosaic, at the end of which you aren’t sure of Hassan’s role in the entire affair. Is his compulsion to repeat this story every year simply his effort to exonerate his brother, Mustafa, from the crime? Or is Hassan himself involved in the mystery?
In the true tradition of oral storytelling, there are as many questions as there are answers. As many loose ends as tied.
A storyteller at Marrakesh Image by theboybg via Flickr
One thing is for sure, Bhattacharya has a way with words. Although all of the action takes place around Hassan at the Jemma, and the entire novel is set during one evening of storytelling, you’ll be immersed in the sights and sounds of the “most storied city square in the word,” travel the Sahara, and hear the dolphins play in the ocean.
This is the first in a planned trilogy set in the Islamic world. I only hope that the rest of the novels don’t take this story forward. For though some things may be left open to interpretation, I think a trilogy would spoil the mystery of this novel and go against the form of storytelling Bhattacharya has employed here.
Overall, this is an interesting book that I found really hard to put down (and that, in part, made me determined to take the reading deprivation challenge). Highly recommended.
In The Artist’s Way (which, by the way, I have never managed to finish…discipline has fled the house!) Julia Cameron recommends a week of reading deprivation – she bans books, newspapers, magazines, everything – for at least one whole week. When I first read that, I balked at the very thought of it. And needless to say, didn’t follow through with the rest of the program.
But now, as I think about it, it makes a lot of sense – at least for me. It boggles the mind to think of the amount of time I would have to pursue other activities if I wasn’t compulsively stuck with my nose in a book every free second of every single day. I finish one book, sit back, inhale, and then wander over to my bookshelf to pull out the next book and start reading again.
Image by Josh Russell via Flickr
It’s starting to get freakish, this obsession I have with books. It starts in the morning – I curl up on the sofa with my cup of java to kick me awake and a book in my hand, reading at a feverish pace. I have to keep reminding myself that I need to move my butt and get ready for work. Once I’m back home in the evening, I rush through the chores (of changing and washing my face) and sit down to read. And read until well past bedtime, with mini breaks in between to welcome the husband home, squeeze in some small talk so he doesn’t think I’m insane, and during dinner.
Pathetic. Unhealthy. Irrational.
I’m beginning to see the sense in Julia Cameron’s approach. It’s time to bite the bullet. For someone as addicted it as me, it calls for serious measures. SO…reading deprivation for a month!
….
….
Wait! Did I just write that? Think that? What the hell is wrong with me? I’m never going to be able to stick with that! So…a compromise….How about…umm…a week? Every month? Reasonable enough, don’t you think?
But first, I have to finish the book I’m currently reading. And the one I’ve already decided to read after I finish this one. (I told you I was obsessive.) Then, a week of no reading. At all.
I am from the paint streaked canvas, from a box of fine Godiva chocolates and a flute of sweet rose wine.
I am from the sheltered world of Ashoka lined row houses, the smell of the jasmine flower wafting through the warm summer breeze.
I am from the river flowing fast and hard in the back yard, the huge Gulmohar tree whose branches lent themselves to day dreams.
I am from family dinners and knowledge seekers, from Mehrotras and Seths and Tandons.
I am from the young at heart, the rose tinted glasses never quite coming off. From instructions to be home before sundown and advice to always follow your heart.
I am from Shiva and Laxmi and the whole Hindu pantheon. From morning prayers and the sweet smell of incense floating in the air.
I am from a hospital by the sea in Singapore, descended from Aryans belonging to the verdant north Indian plains, from summer yellow lentils and golden wheat bread.
From the love and indulgence of my grandfather, the unquestioned love of my grandmother, the discipline imposed by my mother and the reasoning offered by my father.
I am from memories made all over the world as I sailed the seas with my parents, from piles of photographs stored in the cupboard and beautiful paintings lining the walls.
I am from dreams spun curled up at the window near my study table, from stories read and re-read on lazy summers spent belly down in the cool, green grass.
I am from friends real and imaginary, from a baby sister I fought with and for, from rebellions and reconciliations, from love, love, love.
Oh, the smell of fresh paper. The feel of the rough page beneath my hand. The sense of possibilities expanding before me, as I gathered together my thoughts, put pen to paper, and wrote.
Gone are those good old days of keeping a hand-written journal. Of carrying around a diary everywhere I went, so I was never stumped if inspiration struck, or if I saw a particularly good quote that I wanted to note down forever, or just wanted to ruminate.
Click image to purchase on Amazon
Gone are those days spent flicking through old journals. Looking at ticket stubs from that movie I went for on my first date. Of the restaurant bill from the last time I met up with my gang. The coffee spill that put so much more atmosphere into the story of me that I was writing.
All of that has been replaced with my iPhone. True, it’s much smaller and lighter than my diary. It’s with me everywhere I go. The chances of my forgetting it anywhere are slim. But it’s just not the same as my dear diary.
There are no pages to rifle through. No coffee spills to highlight passages of my life. No drunken scrawls that I cannot decipher the morning after. It’s too neat. Too structured. Too…cold.
Click image to purchase on Amazon
Maybe its time for me to go and buy myself a new diary. A leather-bound one this time, maybe. To doodle. To write. To keep for posterity. So that years later, when I am dust scattered over the earth, someone can come across it and say “Oh, so that’s what writing looked like in those ancient days!”
What do you think? Do you miss your hand-written diary? Or are you happy recording your thoughts digitally?
Maya Angelou is probably one of the most influential poet alive. She certainly is one of my favorite. I remember watching an episode on Oprah where she interviewed Maya Angelou, and one of the things she said that day, that stayed with me throughout the years, was that she never allowed people to talk negatively in her house. She said it created disharmonious vibrations that disturbed the peace and tranquility of her living space.
Today, I share with you a short clip, where Oprah talks to Maya Angelou, recounting the most important life lessons she heard from her.
Egypt. Venice. Turkey. The top three destinations on my must-visit wish list. Europe, Australia and South East Asia are some of the other places I want to travel to. The US has never been high on my list of priorities. Yet, for my first international vacation as an adult traveling on my own money, I chose New York City.
Why you ask? Well, my wee lil baby sister lives there and I have a US visa courtesy my office. The official trip fell through, but I figured the visa shouldn’t be wasted.
I managed to wrangle a 3-week vacation, and decided to spend that time in NYC, Washington and Orlando. I could have rushed through a few more places, but I wanted to soak in the atmosphere instead of checking things off an imaginary things-every-tourist-must-see-and-do list.
Picnic at Brooklyn Park
The differences between the US and India were palpable almost from the moment I got off the plane. Within the first few moments, I saw both the famous American rudeness courtesy an airport ground staff member who harangued a bunch of passengers who were standing unobtrusively in one corner and quickly filling out their immigration form, and American friendliness, as another staffer patiently explained the immigration process to an elderly man on a wheelchair who was evidently visiting the US for the first time.
Walking out of the airport, the first sight that greeted me was a line of yellow New York taxi cabs. That’s when the feeling of being abroad really sunk in, and the excitement mounted. So what if I never had New York City on my places to visit before I die list.
New York taxi cab
The wee sister lives in Weehawken, New Jersey. The cheapest way to get there was by the bus – the cab charges $40 from Port Authority, opposed to the bus, which takes $2.50 for the 7-minute ride – which we took from the Port Authority bus station. That was a bus station? It was HUGE! The advertisements called it a place to hang out and have fun…and maybe even take a bus. If you really wanted to hang out at a bus station, you could choose to go there for a meal, a quick coffee or deserts, and even to do some quick shopping! Plus, it was clean, and despite the huge number of people, it was quiet! A sharp contrast to Delhi’s main bus terminal (for inter-state travel), which is a huge, sprawling, littered cacophony of noise and smells.
Grand Central Station, New York
Being a tourist in a foreign land with a limited amount of money means that you have to do the unthinkable and use public transport. I rarely use public transport in India. My only experience is with the Mumbai local train, which most people in my adopted city of Delhi find nightmarish. I mastered the trick of using the local early on, though. Positioning. Position yourself in the middle of the crowd waiting to board or disembark from the train, and the mass of humanity will push you in the right direction. You really don’t need to do anything else. In Delhi, though, I either drive or call for a cab. So the thought of having to use the New York subway gave me the heebie-jeebies. Until I got to the subway station. And got into the tube. No pushing and shoving. No touching and feeling. Even if the compartment was crowded and there was no place to sit. What a revelation that was! If someone accidentally bumps into you they immediately apologize and try to create some more space. Which is so welcome after the uncouth Delhi men. Though that also means that I had to be careful about invading someone elses space. Stand too close (like at an arm’s length away from someone) to a person and you’re likely to attract dirty glances. In India, we’re used to this kinda closeness. To people glancing over your shoulder at the cash counter, for example, to look at what you’ve purchased. Or to just stare at you. Yeah, that happens a lot. You just get used to it. So being ‘invisible’ in the US felt…good!
Zumba class outside Macys, New York
Then there’s the politeness. Though my uncle, who has been in the US since, like, forever, calls it a ‘chocolate’ society, as a tourist, you’ll find that the people are friendly. And friendly starts from your bus driver. Who you actually greet when you get on. And thank when you get off. Amazing. Especially since I come from a country where drivers are transparent. Seriously. Though in the US, so are we women. The people may be friendly and polite and nice, but no one really looks at you. Even if you wear clothes that show more than they hide. No lecherous stares. No lewd comments. No sleazy men following you around. Liberating!
New Yorker walking her dog, Battery Park, New York
Then there’s the sense of fun. If they like something, they’re vocal about it. Like on a Thursday outside Macy’s on 34th and Broadway, there was a free Zumba class. People kept joining in. Spectators watched. Tourists took pictures. And when they finished, everyone cheered and clapped and hooted. In India, you wouldn’t catch anyone doing anything like that out in public in the middle of the day. Ever. Nor would you find couples on the street or in the park, train, shop or restaurant smooching or hugging or publicly displaying affection. Not that it doesn’t happen at all, but let’s just say that it’s restricted to high-end malls and isn’t quite that blatant.
Hanging around in the park
Ingrained with that sense of celebration is a love for parks. For sitting under the shade of a tree (or even out in the sun on the steps of a monument) listening to music, having lunch, working, relaxing. Which is probably why you’ll find a small park on almost every street. With a Witch store selling sandwiches and coffee. And more often than not, in those parks and on the streets (and even inside stores!) you’ll find fashionable New Yorkers with their four-legged friends (almost always dogs). You can’t go more than a few steps without spotting a dog and its owner. And if you, dear tourist, want to experience what that’s like, you can buy yourself a dog-shaped balloon that skims across the road alongside or behind you. Yes, really!
Fashionable, vibrant, bustling, always-awake New York – you own a piece of my heart!
Sweet Sanctuary tells the story of single mom Wren and her gifted son Charlie. It tells the story of Wren’s family, of how it was torn apart by a horrible incident in their childhood. It weaves in romance, forgiveness and faith.
Yes, there is a strong Christian tone to the story. There’s a lot about putting your faith in God and trusting in him to show you the way. But if you can live with that, you will be rewarded with a beautiful story and wonderful characters.
Sheila Walsh has crafted a fine tale populated with a cast of characters you’ll come to care about. Wren, a librarian with a love for books and a penchant for wondering how her favorite female literary characters will react to any given situation, is struggling to fully accept the Lord and hand over her worries to him. Charlie is a wonderful 10-year old gifted boy who prays to see is mother happy again. That happiness comes from Paul, the restaurant owner who Wren eventually, despite herself, falls in love with, and from the forgiveness and healing of Bette stop ship with her elder sister Barb and younger brother Jack.
Despite the fact that I am not a Christian or into Faith-based books, I enjoyed this novel. I think it would make for a good summer read.
Our earth, known in some cultures as Gaia, is the giver and sustainer of life. We need to respect her too, as this Native American Hopi Elder explains.
When I go back home on holiday, my morning routine is to fix myself a cup of tea and head down to the garden with a newspaper. I spend about an hour leisurely sipping a hot cuppa and reading the paper from cover to cover (well, almost!). Every time I return back, I promise myself that I will get up earlier so that I can read at least the headlines and a couple of stories before I rush off to work. But, I’m a late sleeper and a late riser, and reading the newspaper is something that I just cannot fit in to my morning rush to get to work. I used to try to get onto a newspaper website before I started the day at office so I was not totally oblivious to the world around me, but that didn’t always happen.
Given our increasingly busy lifestyles and the proliferation of the internet and smartphones, it’s no wonder that newspapers (especially in the US) are seeing subscriber numbers fall. To deal with the loss of subscribers and declining ad sales, a few publishers are once again putting their online content behind a pay wall. The NYT has started asking users to pay up if they want unlimited access to digital content, and News Corp. put so much faith in the proliferation of content on tablets and on the success of Apple’s offering that it launched an iPad only subscription news magazine The Daily.
Gone are those days spent flicking through old journals. Looking at ticket stubs from that movie I went for on my first date. Of the restaurant bill from the last time I met up with my gang. The coffee spill that put so much more atmosphere into the story of me that I was writing.
Maybe its time for me to go and buy myself a new diary. A leather-bound one this time, maybe. To doodle. To write. To keep for posterity. So that years later, when I am dust scattered over the earth, someone can come across it and say “Oh, so that’s what writing looked like in those ancient days!”
