parotechnics

When I was in school we had to write this essay - the one place I'd love to visit. I wrote an essay on Italy which was a place of kitsch images - you could make a Matrix sim card ad with those images. As I grew older I was lucky to make friends from other places, among them Francesca, an honest to goodness Italian. I learnt that pineapple is ananas in Italian too. And everything I'd learn about Italy made me want to go there even more even as my stereotypes softened, deepened. So finally this summer I did. My friends Maria and David had rented a villa in small village near the town called Todi and they very kindly invited me to stay. The villa had its own swimming pool, there were fruit trees scattered around, I slept, read murder mysteries, swam and played with the kids. And ate of course. Innumerable, exquisite meals. THE VERANDAH WHERE WE ATE THE VIEW FROM MY WINDOW Often we'd do day trips - to little towns nearby.It was like a very spread out Chandni Chowk, a town per c...

“It’s almost un-American at this point to say you don’t want children, especially from an image perspective,” said Ms. Min, who spoke to The Observer the day her magazine broke the news of Jennifer Lopez’s pregnancy. “It’s almost like saying you’re a communist.” And not just in America either. I remember when I was in college we had a catch all solution to any question the teachers asked - why was X thing happening in the Rennaisance? Up would go our hands - the rise of the middle classes. And the teacher would go, oh those middle classes, they've been rising forever, they just keep rising. And so they do. Nowadays I find that if I say anything on above subject (Maternal Fascism) I have to ammend by saying, "Hey, some of my best friends have kids and I love them. All I'm saying is...."

See - my mtnl broadband saga was a sort of interruptus in the coitus of blogging from which I never recovered. Since it's all so dependent on the photographs, I've been writing a loooooong post about Italy with all pictures, one line a week I guess. Also - please note to the right of us - I am just a nice girl with a big backlog. I am being true to myself therefore and spitting at all those who sniggeringly think it's big backside instead of big backlog. But now that this huge number of two people are demanding I write,I am feeling important. Italy post will and must be completed and will appear before I leave. Thank god I forgot to take my camera to Kathmandu otherwise my backlog would have gotten worse.

"Lasch, by contrast, looked at the American and found him peering into a mirror, anxiously rating the figure staring back at him and wondering how to combat the inexplicable emptiness he felt." Not just Americans if you ask me.

The only time I felt no objection to the pornography of repitition that is Indian news TV. It is not possible for me to do any work when NDTV India shows a half hour program on the making of Dil Mein Mere Hai Dard-e-Disco. I don't know if the film will be as good as Main Hoon Na - whether it will be over-referential and overworked in general. I'm rooting for it to work. What I like about this song is that it doesn't just act smart and mock other people's work, in making an ironic comment, it also seriously adds to the popular vocabulary. Oh who am i kidding. I love SRK, his baady, his goofy grin, his knowing eyes, his tongue so firmly in cheek. So does she Dard-e-disco Come on now let's go

I have been trying to write - I have python deadlines which tighten as I struggle. And I am distracted by dragonflies. If you've got a window, look out and do you see how many there are nowadays? I squatted on my window sill for half an hour trying to take a picture but it's a fool's errand.They may look huge but they're fast and feckless and diaphonous after all. I never knew they could fly this high (I live on the 4th flloor and they are flying above the trees. A few days ago it was a profusion of yellow butterflies - didn't know they flew this high either. Distracted myself from work by trying to post about my time in Italy but got further sidetracked and ended up reading this somewhat amusing piece about Anonioni and Bergman in the afterlife. Not that it's all that funny - you may chuckle mildly on occasion, like at "Antonioennui" - but it's actually a more interesting way to read about two filmmakers about whom you may have already read so mu...

I have broadband after 4 months of fighting with MTNL. I am hoping it stays on but well... And with more computer housekeeping happening, also, lovely pictures from when my friend Tara was visiting with her kids and her husband Jambi. I like it that they could come to my house and I'd been to theirs, that feeling of continuity and belonging. I also like how well trained these kids are in the massage department.The high point of the technicque is a little jiggling dance they do when they get to your bottom and believe me they don't even know the heaven this is in places like God's own country. And also how lovely they are. I do miss them.