Buildings of London

There has been a geographical shift in my muse. What used to be the serene streets of India has now shifted to the heart of London. But, as the old saying goes 'Old habits die hard'. So here I am in London, making one more of my lists!
All the architects can pay attention for they might end up with a lucrative deal to build something in central London, for these are the prerequisites.

1. There is only one way for the building to grow, that is straight up into the sky!

2. You can use concrete if you want but , Glass has to be the main ingredient.

3. Walkie-Talkie, Cheese-grater, glass Shards and cucumbers are all valid shapes of buildings. So you better be creative! Wine bottle, crown, basketball shoes, lettuce are some unexplored shapes. The Queen's Guard's Hat can even win you an award.

4. No building is complete without two cranes, placed strategically at the top. Not to forget the red lights to warn the heavy air traffic.

5. Neon lighting for the night is quintessential. Especially in the winters when most of the day is night.

6. To balance the excessive use of neon lights, do provide solar panels to silence the environmentalists. Although the energy produce from those panels will be enough to light one small cigarette.

7. Name the building as XYZ "wharf". It will work.

8. Inaugurate the building by inviting a member of the Royal Family and ask him to Base Jump/ Rappel/ Bungee Jump/ Jump from the top floor.

9. Advertise by saying that the building has an 'AMAZING' view. (Yes If you stand on the top of the crane you might be able to see a part of the London Eye, and trust me its amazing!)

10. Finally wash your hands in the Thames and head to Dubai/Doha for your next project.

Ode to EggPuff

Do not expect a poem just because I titled the post with an "ode". I chose that word because it is normally when people praise or appreciate something both intellectually and emotionally.
I praise, appreciate and enjoy that beautiful creation called 'Egg Puff'!

There are few food items in this world that pack such a powerful punch as the egg puff! A little research on the internet reveals its a popular street food in Honk Kong. One thing i am sure about is , those puffs from the far east are not the ones I am in love with. These are home bred, made in the bakeries (owned predominantly either by a Krishna loving red liners, or by citizens of gods own country), kept in steel incubators with a bulb as yellow as the puff itself,  served on a piece of newsprint, and to be eaten right outside the bakery counter!

What is it that makes this artery clogging devil so good? Let me dive into the impossible task of describing that divine feeling.

As soon as you order one, the baker takes it out of the incubator. Immune to its heat, he places it on piece of newspaper. The news paper readily accepts the egg puff and starts to blot with oil, a sure sign of succumbing to its power! The baker then takes a knife and cuts the puff into two halves. Few crunchy pieces fall out (these serve as the last bite too). Some steam escapes and the beautiful yellow and white curves are revealed.
The first bite into an egg puff is always filled with greed (do refer to my previous post). One normally wants the egg-white, the yellow, the onions, the masala and some of the deep fried layers, all to come in one bite! If one succeeds he/she is surely an "egg-puff Pro"! This greedy bite is normally followed by a couple of minutes of agony. For the eater, seduced by the looks of the puff, will have completely forgotten the incubator, which made the puff "hot"!

When the taste buds are hit by the aura of the puff they melt! they melt in confusion, sending signals to the brain, unable to decipher the ecstasy! It is spicy, yet sweet with egg white, it is crunchy, yet soft with the yellow, it has vegetables, yet egg to satisfy the naughty primordial instincts of the hunter, it is healthy but deep fried. It is the ying and the yang. It has the creator and the destroyer.
The second bite sends a crackle through the body, with the teeth enjoying in crushing the deep fried base. The mouth is covered in a thin layer of fat momentarily , before it is washed away by the vegetables and the masala.
The final step is when the fallen debris of this monumental snack, is transferred from the fourth-estate to the palm of ones hand. That last remnants create a the feeling of the sparks after a fireworks show.
With the stomach satisfied, the brain mesmerized, the newsprint serves as a tissue paper, taking out all the oil from the hands, but leaves a lingering smell just to keep us hungry before it reaches the dustbin!

Words. I want the police to arrest the words on charges of defamation. For words have just not described the egg-puff well! There is only one way you can do justice to an egg puff, and you all know how.

Greed for Needs

Once I moved out of the comfort of high school, problems concerning the society started to become visible. Economic, social and political problems were suddenly everywhere. People are in a constant fight to live, to earn a living and maintain a family. This constitutes to a majority of the population in India. There is the creamy elite and the rich middle-class of India who are in a whole different world of smartphones and German cars!
I got to travel a lot of Southern India, thanks to the research project I was assisting. This opened up my mind to the disparity of wealth that exists in the country. All the reports, articles and books I had read about wealth disparity, started to come to life!
The greatest luxury we have is that we are confident about our next meal!
As the thought process on how to solve the disparity in wealth, when one is staying in a capitalistic market, lead me to this idea.
Its known that when the people at the bottom of the pyramid are working for their living, the rich are haunting the luxuries. What happens when the rich get greedy about human needs? By human needs I mean Air, Water, Food, Shelter and Clothing. The rich are greedy for better air- they can buy hybrids, reduce carbon emission etc. The rich are greedy for food- help the farmer grow better. They are greedy for better clothing- finance the thousands of garment workers. So with their greed of needs increasing the whole society is developing, and to an extent disparity is reduced.

But this is Utopian. How can we draw a line for human greed? If there is anything as infinite as the human imagination, its his greed. Even in the wildest futures, the above thought materializes, will the farmer/garment worker be satisfied with what he has?

I feel the concept of "Greed for Needs" is a step which can at least lead the consumerist society in spending for the betterment of the society. What can be the solution? Marx's vision is impossible now. This time when we have fallen, tangled, knotted deep in the abyss of Capitalism.  

Hell ride in God's own country.

A couple of days ago I realized that I have an affinity to board ridiculously strange buses. I also realized it was never out of choice , but pure chance. Here is my latest one.

This bus was supposed to take me from Mannadavady (a small town in Kerala) to Kalpetta (a small town in Kerala, where 2:1 is the ratio of gold jewellery shops to number of people).
Let me provide a formalist view of the bus first. A 30 seater bus, of an unknown make. The paint job was a vibrant pink and purple over off-white. The interior was heavily chromed (the railings, supports etc). The upholstery seemed heavier than the chrome. Maroon velvet seat covers covered with dark blue diamonds, and shining off-white head rests. With the shiny poles and cushioned seats, the bus resembled a strip-club, with the obvious elements missing!

The wind shield of the bus had a board which said that it was a 'Fast Passenger'. What was thought to be a good thing, was actually not! There are two possibilities I inferred, either the bus was one of those raerest-of-rare artifacts where the brake is an extra throttle, or the driver has a firm belief that the horn itself is the brake. The bus did not slow down to anything. Sharp curves, head-on traffic, cows, Lungi clad road crossers , come what may the bus did not slow down. If the people at CERN had traveled in this bus before, they would not have wasted so much money on a particle accelerator. At about this time , I threw my bucket list out of the window, as I clearly did not see the point of having one.

I looked around to see if anything in the bus would give me comfort. There was a 'No Smoking' board. Obviously, anyone who tries to smoke at this speed is risking a burnt face ( Like one of those road runner cartoons). Next to it was the Complaint Box and as expected there was no box. It understood that once you have seen "The Light" there is no use complaining. Plus if you survived, you should be happy to be alive, so No Complaints!

Next my eyes moved to the First aid box. That was certainly a relief. I was confident that at the moment of adversity, there would surely be help to nurse the cut on my little toe finger. Although I would have to wait for the medics to tend to my cracked skull, broken neck, collapsed lungs, ruptured intestines, displaced spine and not to mention a couple of bruises here and there. Then I realized that even the first-aid kit was missing. I need to appreciate the owners of this bus for their impressive thinking. They had replaced the kit with the music system! Ah! What better thing than music to heal the petrified soul! I then paid attention to the music. One of the most popular Bollywood song of the 90's"Dil to pagal hai" (the heart is mad) was playing. Quite an apt song for one has to be mad to get into this ride!

Fortunately Kalpetta arrived. I was still breathing, my "pagal heart" was still beating and I used all the adrenalin in my body to jump out on to terra firma! As the bus zoomed, I saw Emergency Exit written on the back of the bus. It was not an exit for the bus, but in case you wanted an "emergency exit" from the beautiful life in Kerala, you had to take this Hell ride in God's Own Country!

Party time!!!

Parties. the "life" for some youth, the bane for some "elders". I have attended quite a few parties and most of them have a lot in common. Only a few parties really stand out! Let me tell you what I did this Friday night. This was not one of the usual 9-12 parties!

The club and the dance floor was a overused SETC bus. There are posters of parties which claim that they will take you places, this one was taking me from Ooty to Coimbotore for sure! The crowd was cosmopolitan, but also had a weird mix of grandmothers, tiny tots and grey headed grand-dad hipsters. As the party started, the music from the speakers (which seemed right out of 80's rock show) began to engulf the bus. Foot-thumping Tamil numbers set the right tempo to the party.

The crowed swayed its hips to the music spun by our DJ (they had no option as Physics forced them to). The way he spun his wheel, everyone swayed in unison, almost in sync with the beat. Unlike Tiesto's all white apparel (Wikipedia, if you were not born between 1980-2000), our DJ was in all brown. He changed gears like discs, spinning the wheel constantly!

This party, unlike any other had its usual elements. The "bores" who felt the party wasn't good and the usual bunch who come with a lot of baggage (pun intended). The party had a lot of dangerous curves which made it really exciting. Other clubs (read: vehicles) passed us by like faces which pass by on the dance floor.

The crowd was intoxicated with the beauty outside, the full moon acting like a disco ball, making the forest below shine! The party which started off cold in ooty, was pretty hot as it neared Coimbotore. As people got off the club, there was that familiar look on faces of everyone, the look which showed desperation to get back home and crash (party jargon intended).

I being a club hopper, continued my party scene. The welcome that I got in the next club was almost homely. The girls voice was very familiar. By the time I tried to figure out who that was, she screamed in my ear " Welcome to Indian Railways, Train number 61234.... "