Figuring Things Out

 Call it a calculated conspiracy of algorithms but over the last week I watched two 'recommended' TED videos, each dealing with with...

  Today's Doodle honours Kano Jigoro, the 'Father of Modern Judo ' on his 161st birth anniversary. A series of neat panels illus...

It's 5:30AM and there is a nip in the air. You look out from the balcony and your gaze moves up from the empty roads, the streetlights, ...

Remember this post about 'The Most Translated Books of the World' ?  Well, a few days ago, I decided to pick one of the few European...

Paravur Kayal (lagoon), Kerala Has the Covid Pandemic changed the way Indians travel? What has been the impact of the cascade of lockdowns  ...

 The precise shifting positions of the rising and setting sun through the year is a phenomenon observed thousands of years ago. The ancient ...

  Every now and then the great circus of Whatsapp forwards comes up with a gem, and this is one of them. A beautifully illustrated poster on...

"There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen"--Vladimir Ilyich Lenin What has been happening...

 Indians have been suckers for more than six decades. This was my main takeaway from Vijay Gokhale's recent book, "The Long Game - ...

Once again, Afghanistan has hit the headlines; once again for all the wrong reasons. Unlike my earlier post which was written after the mos...

  Statistics was never one of my favourite subjects. When faced with grades at the wrong end of the bell-curve , I would console myself with...

Looks like a Van Gogh? - a painting sequel to the Starry Night perhaps? It's actually a projection of wind-speeds visualised by the big...

Each time I finish reading a book by Haruki Murakami I swear that I am not going to fall for his formula again. Just like Bollywood script-w...

  Long ago, a wisecrack noted that mosquitos fly amidst applause. This must have been before the invention of the electronic fly swatter.  O...

A big fat book by a lanky ex-President. I have been seeing it in our bookshops for a year now but being innately suspicious of politicians -...

The past two weeks have quite harrowing for many of us. The news of neighbours, friends and acquaintances losing their fight against the nov...

 Yesterday was a day of desperate messages on our neighbourhood e-group: 13:50: "Does anybody know where oxygen cylinders can be purcha...