yet again ... getting lost ... then enjoying self-discovery ...

Plain Tales from the Raj CharlesAllen I enjoy reading of the times gone by and am often left wondering how it would have been to be part of society then at various locations. The pace of life, openness of the places described, people interacting with rivers and forests, all fascinate me. Plain Tales from the Raj does this; it takes me to those times. The book contains stories of coming to a ‘different’ and far-away land, living, adopting lifestyles and thriving in a land where language and culture are alien. Of separation and affairs. Of moving en-masse to the hills in summers. Of solitary and lonely lives. Of same set of activities each day. Of colourful evenings in clubs. Of becoming district magistrates at ( age of ) twenty-one and commanding absolute authority over huge areas; some believing, like Churchill, of their belonging to a superior race. It has repeated references to Rudyard Kipling’s work. I had read Kipling including his vivid description of life in Shimla

Korma, Kheer and Kismet:  Five Seasons in Old Delhi Pamela Timms Aleph Book Company 2014 At one of the panel-discussions at the India Non Fiction Festival at New Delhi I recall Ira Trivedi ( co-panelist with Pamela Timms ) asking her if she did not worry falling sick (eating the street food at Old Delhi that she was then happily describing ). Quickly came the reply that had me intrigued about the book – ‘ the only 2 times I have fallen sick in Delhi is when I have had meals at star hotels in the city, street food is absolutely safe and lovely ’. I later recalled reading couple of articles by Pamela Timms in Mint with lines like ‘ I soon discovered a whole new world of food and flavours to obsess over and crave, light years away from the shrink-wrapped sanitized food culture I had left behind in Scotland, and even the gloopy bland curries I had eaten in Indian restaurants at home ’ . Finally got the book in recent weeks and loved the cover – there’s someth