The Joy of Listening

Last month I was in Delhi for business and as always had several hours to kill before I took the 3am flight back to Hong Kong. I decided to shop for some books and dropped into a nearby Crossword. I saw Shammi Narang – TV news reader from Doordarshan era. I always remembered him for his recital of a legendary poem on Jhansi Ki Rani (written by Subhadra Kumari Chauhan). Shammi was reading from a book and soon I realised he was narrating one of Munshi Premchand’s story – Shatranj Ke Khiladi. It was the launch of a set of three audiobooks by Shammi Narang on Munshi Premchand’s stories.

I sat there for 30 odd mins and really enjoyed the Shammi’s reading. Its been ages since I listened to a story in any of the Indian languages. As a child my life was full of interesting stories – from grandparents, aunts, and of course language teachers. Today our lives are so busy that we’re no longer reading to kids & teenagers – certainly not much in Indian languages. We take the easy of option of placing them in front of TV so that we don’t have to spare time. Sad but true.

Listening to Shammi brought back many memories of listening. It made me feel very nostalgic and I walked out with the audiobooks.

TOI disrespect for Lord Ganesh

Today is Ganesh Chaturthi and I was shocked to see an ad released by The Times of India Bangalore edition. It distorted the image of Lord Ganesh with different objects including building, buses, trucks etc. I was shocked to see that and my feelings were hurt. Being a secular country does not mean that you show disrespect to Hindu Gods.

I’m sure pseudo-secularist will argue that it is ‘modern art’ and ‘freedom of expression’ but would the Times dare to do the same with Jesus or Mohammed? Then why Ganesh? I wonder how would editors/publishers of The Times of India react if we were to portray their family members in a distorted fashion. Show some garbage coming out of their mouth, their hair made of wires, their legs made up on tubes etc. I’m very sure that they won’t take it nicely.

My religious sentiments are hurt and I’m for sure thinking ways to make The Times of India responsible.

Here is the image that hurt my feelings.

1 sec took 97 years

On 16th August, Usain Bolt broke his own record in 100m men’s race and clocked 9.58 seconds.

Economist.com put out an interesting analysis (picture below). In 1912 Don Lippincott created record in 100m by clocking 10.6 seconds. So it has taken 97 years to shave off 1 second from the record. I admire Usain Bolt but I think Don Lippincott’s achievement was ever greater as he didn’t get help from all the modern technology (shoes & clothing) and training.

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