Brown Motion

There is a lot of ground to cover if one wanted to visit all the 190 plus officially recognized countries in our world. A lot of them have even more water to cover to get to them. But the family all aligned on the merits of burning fossil fuels to appreciate other cultures embarked on few voyages in the past two decades and came back with lots of pictures and memories to last this lifetime. Below are glimpses from the five of seven continents we touched down on..in no particular order.. and merely arranged based on the laziness of finding these gems by yours truly Above pic is of my breakfast in Pune, India High calorific content amidst a humid and noisy ambience not captured in the picture the rice lentil crepe is a crispy delight. Above vista is a ski slope near the Tahoe basin of the Sierra Nevada range in winter in Northern California. Bull. No really ... it is a big deal in India.  It is what Shiva the destructor of this universe rode on.. as myths go i...

I had no idea who Queen was until I saw the Oscar winning movie titled 'Bohemian Rhapsody'. While bit long in the tooth this biopic showed the ascendancy of a rather unlikely chap from an Indian Parsi family, born in Africa, becoming the rock and roll legend of the 70s and hall of famer after death. As the voice of the band he formed and what came to be known worldwide as Queen, Farrokh became Freddie Mercury, the lead singer.  I do think his success had a bit of luck in that he found the unlikely trio as his support cast to play guitar and drums. The movie meanders predictably at times to show what becomes of success and yet drives the audience into enjoying with the cast.  The guy had preacher like charisma and could get millions to stand on their feet and sway to his voice and music. While similar in tone and tempo to contemporaries in music at the time like Abba or Wham the music did have a high energy to it.  It also tended to not be always predictable and w...

Selling the promise of higher education in brand name campuses is now reached level of maturity where the sheep are drawn to the slaughter house with a simple email invite. Marketing costs have come way down.  Asians (by that largely Chinese and Indian ex pat) will arrive in droves to seminars hosted on school property with a Chinese speaker who may have a couple of female lackeys putting up a powerpoint to walk through.  The pitch is asking the lost souls to sign up for 1 on 1 consulting for their child in exchange for mucho dinero. Note this is touted as a legit way to gain access to top tier schools without going to jail or forking out large gobs of cash as donations. Mere mention that the founder had something to do with an Ivy League brand (might as well have done some obscure week long management training course) will draw out the hyper anxious parents wanting to better their children's lives. While the parental motivation may be real the path chosen is oft misg...

The title at first glance might seem suggestive of something lurid perhaps if you have a fertile mind like mine.  Phonetically rhyming ideas like a nubile Kate Winslet on a big ship on open ocean come to mind but it is much more intriguing than that.  I recently in my early morning navigation of the WWW stumbled on this.  A dude make that a famous maestro of classical music from India playing Carnatic music on the Saxophone.  Hence the title. To put all this in context - a brief primer on the Saxophone.  Invented by a Belgian fella called Adolphe Sax it is a wind instrument made popular in the early 20th century by the birth of jazz music.  While the Sax as the saxophone came to be referred in shorthand is largely associated with big brass bands and the music of the south it has found several artistic interpretations and use in other genres such as Carnatic. A quick primer on Carnatic - it is the classical music of south India (result of a vague bou...

As large network programming goes I am not a fan,  and cannot remember much of any particular show that I clicked with since coming to America two decades ago. Every person follows something they individually crave or have a deep affection for and seek out a life to live vicariously through the media they watch. In our case both the wife and I love to eat and explore flavors - we live to eat - and try to appreciate the varied lifestyles of the people that inhabit this oblate hardware we call Earth.  To that point we have been fortunate to visit some remote parts of this planet from the southern fringes of Australia and New Zealand to the northern latitudes of Alaska and some parts in between. Food of course comes in many forms sometimes living and mostly dead (assuming it had parents) and can be manipulated in terms of texture and the final flavor profile before it hits your plate and your palate. Growing up with a largely vegetarian diet in a country where a cow is s...

I have been in many a crowd.  If you take the idioms to heart that would make me a perpetual occupant of one - crowd that is.  Since two is company and three is a crowd. But I am referring to the serious mass accumulations on the planet.  I have been amidst a variety of those.  They are different in their mood and temperament as I have come to notice. They are also temporary or constant.  The crowd phenom is one where I am one amidst many of my species but not necessarily of my cultural background (I'm not sure what that may be but whatever) in the literal sense. Say for example traipsing through a national park in some country.  Many nationalities and varieties of humans are crowding to see the major natural landscape and gape in awe in their own special way.  These are ephemeral events as these individuals disperse at the onset of dusk or where they have a flight to catch etc.  They have arrived from many parts of the globe to witness s...

Am reading this book in no particular order.  Written by a 90 year old food critic, or more appropriately food lover, Mimi Sheraton is one lucky lady. She has had this enviable job for the past 60 years and so in her travels she has managed to eat her way through a lot. She professes to eating out half the time during the week which is at least seven meals even at this age.  She eats whatever she wants and honestly if she can say that on public TV to a serious journalist then I want to believe it. Apparently eating in moderation has kept her healthy and lovely.  She can still climb three stories of her multi level home in NY without any aid or implements other than her own wheels. This book was first published in 2015 and covers a vast geography in terms of food origins and their national appeal.  The best places to forage are also listed along side the recipe.  Food name origins and other etymological tidbits make for an interesting read. Personally ...

Many a trip to me is a pilgrimage of sorts - the religion being curiosity.  Some throw curveballs and are rather exhausting in their execution simply because the destination happens to be rather remote.  But making the most of the journey (to harp on an oft harped cliche) does add flavor to the experience. So here are some more of these exotically intoxicating and 'holier than thou' (you will figure out what I mean) adventures... We start in New Zealand on the north eastern coast of the south island (the country has two main islands - north and south) and travel along the eastern edge hugging the Pacific. Departure from PICTON NZ Through tunnels and down the coast to Christchurch  Few hours north from NZ, crossing the equator and you are in the tiny island country of Singapore.. Neat and tidy this once Victorian trading post and gateway to the riches of Asia is now a well oiled business machine.   Hanging out at the local D...

The Pope was jealous of Narendra Modi aka NaMo.  You could see it in his sad look as he traveled on the east coast and did not get to meet the valley elite.  Both lead over a billion people, each of different faiths, both sport four letter call signs and yet the contrast in their visits was palpable. Even Lord Ganesh who was the Silicon Valley Idol until last weekend probably had a feeling of being let down (in the SF bay and otherwise) as the fickle crowds switched their chants from Om Ganesha to NaMo. The Indian Prime Minister flew in on his own havai jahaj aka an American made Boeing 747, painted with colors of Air India to its maiden flight into San Jose International Airport right in the middle of the techno campii (plural of campus maybe). He spoke in Hindi (translated by some traveling babus to English and making for a very confusing message) to the cult of ex-pats that went to greet him and that surrounded him like no surround sound ever did, chanting his n...

Another classic title for a wannabe Hollywood thriller.  Hardly.  Real life experience - 100%. I had decided to visit the well preserved relics of the Chola dynasty along India's eastern shores this summer.  Of import were two sites - Gangaikonda Cholapuram 100 km south of Pondi and Breehadeshwara Temple (Shiva HQ) another 100 km ot so to its south outside Tanjore (aka Tanjavore). Having my next train connection in Tanjore I decided to cab it from Pondi (the onetime French bastion) to visit these one off and relatively inaccessible UNESCO sites before culminating at Tanjore station. So I worked with my local contact in Pondi to find a relatively economical mode of transport yet with the luxury of stretching out, perhaps catching some much needed zzz's as well.  The hotel manager came up with a dude named Hitler. No kidding.  I inquired with as much PC manner as possible as to the origin's and validity of the fella's name but came up with zilch. Okay -...

A lot of foodie influences make for a wonderful film showcasing cast and crew from various continents. Directed by a Swede (L Hallstrom whose film credits include movies about edible items - Chocolat, Gilbert Grape etc); the film stars are French-Canadian, British, Indian and an American of Indian origins.  The Indian hero of the film has a food item for a last name - Puri (a puffed fried bread made from wheat flour). It is a tale, an adaptation from a book - about two restaurant owners who vie for success in the French countryside.  One is an established Michelin star winner and the other across the street - 100 feet apart- an upstart started by a migrant family from India. As cuisine goes the story tries to dispel the notion that one country's food can be superior to another while conveying that what really matters in the end is in the palate of the beholder.  It also does a decent job of effectively showcasing some masala - the edible kind - not item numbers - th...

A recall in America is as American as apple pie.  Frankly I am not sure how many Americans actually consume Apple Pie these days but it is cute to refer to this cliche every chance one gets.  So I did.  Frankly the warm flaky crusts with a sourish apple inside is not my idea of a fun food.  Esp when the apples used therein are called Granny Smith's.  Maybe Granny likes it but I do not. Back to the Recall idea. We Americans strongly believe that a product sold in market must meet its advertised qualities and if unable to do so must be promptly recalled.  Ideally by the manufacturer of the offending product. We see it daily - a large chunk of the automobile manufacturing companies are constantly calling back their produce due to a variety of flaws or faults or non-life threatening to definitely life-threatening aspects.  Once such a recall is issued it affects millions of these appliances since they are usually produced and sold in millions. ...