Life

Post Number 49: Around Europe in 100 Days – Nous Voyageons à Paris

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

A travelogue on exploring Paris – tourist spots, commotion, eccentric crowds, and Seine

Still reeling from the adventure of the first day, we took things slowly in the subsequent days. We attended the orientation program of our exchange university, realized there were too many Indians there, got ourselves French SIM cards, explored Lille, realized McDonald’s served beer and that avocado sandwiches were atrocious, visited an art museum that was so painfully dull that we resorted to making memes, went to the local casino, and settled on Maggi as our staple dinner. Over the weekend, Sumit’s friends were going to be in Paris so we decided to join them. Read More

Post Number 48 : Around Europe in 100 Days – L’arrivée en France

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

A travelogue exploring the journey to Europe, full of misadventures and bad luck.

Once upon a time (in 2019), when Corona was but a beer and the word pandemic made one harken back to the days of the Bubonic Plague, I was fortunate to get a chance to travel through Europe in the name of ‘Student Exchange’- the global tourism scheme sustaining many a hostels, dingy pubs, (misguided) 2004 movie enthusiasts, and petty thieves relying on the naivete of unsuspecting kids travelling through post-colonial colonial countries.

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Post Number 47 : The Fault In Our Stars

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

An essay exploring the modern culture of celebrity worship.

*Slight Spoilers for Watchmen, HBO Series*

Last week, I wrapped up my binge of the HBO series, Watchmen. The show (which is excellent, if a little convoluted) had many complex characters. My favourite was FBI agent Laurie Blake, member of the Anti-Vigilante Task Force. Laurie was someone who had lived her life as, with, and around heroes. She embodied layers of paradoxes – she was the younger Silk Spectre, daughter of two superheroes, ex-girlfriend to Dr. Manhattan but she had abandoned her vigilante days to work with the FBI to catch them instead. Despite her disillusionment, she went to those blue phonebooths to leave resentful but hope-filled messages to Dr. Manhattan. The country was full of phonebooths where people voiced their deepest prayers to an omnipotent blue being who’d left for Mars. Holding out for a hero.screen-shot-2019-11-01-at-4-58-41-pm-1572642227

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Post Number 46 : What Do Pandemic Stories Tell Us?

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

An article exploring the themes running through books and movies on pandemics

“…Eyes are also needed to see this picture, a woman laden with plastic bags, going along a rain drenched street, amidst rotting litter and human and animal excrement, cars and trucks abandoned any old way, blocking the main thoroughfare, some of the vehicles with their tyres already surrounded by grass, and the blind, the blind, open-mouthed and staring up at the white sky, it seems incredible that rain should fall from such a sky.”

 – José Saramago

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Post Number 45 : Figuring – Maria Popova

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

An article reviewing the titular book by the famed blogger and writer, Ms. Popova

“Lives interweave with other lives, and out of the tapestry arise hints at answers to questions that raze to the bone of life: What are the building blocks of character, of contentment, of lasting achievement? How does a person come into self-possession and sovereignty of mind against the tide of convention and unreasoning collectivism? Does genius suffice for happiness, does distinction, does love?”

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Post Number 44 : A Millennial’s (Existential) Brush With A Global Pandemic

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

An essay capturing the thoughts upon being quarantined at home due to the pandemic

It wasn’t in my plan to be under a semi-quarantined state upon coming home because of a global pandemic. I suppose it wasn’t in anyone’s plan but here we all are. 2020 has turned out to be quite the year, hasn’t it? Coronavirus has brought the flurry of commotion around the world to a surprising standstill. And thus began my first brush with a global pandemic.

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Post Number 43: A Semi-Nomadic Take On The Idea Of Home

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

An essay exploring the meaning of home, after a life lived on traveling for a while

Some weeks ago in Lisbon, I was asked to fill out a form where I had to write my address. In between countries, as I was then, I asked the receptionist if I had to write my Indian address, my campus address (because of which I was travelling), or the French place where I was living for the past few months. She shrugged nonchalantly and went back to chewing her gum. I scribbled something and returned the form but in that moment I was already thinking about this – about home.

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Post Number 42 : The Importance of Telling Different Stories

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

An essay exploring the need to read and write diverse narratives

I read ‘Beloved’ recently. Beloved is the Pulitzer winning novel by the African-American author, Toni Morrison. Toni’s novels have all focussed on life as an African American. Her characters have always been unapologetically ‘ethnic’ in their thoughts, actions, and beliefs. She was once asked in an interview if she’d consider writing about white people substantially, to which she had responded –

I have had reviews in the past that have accused me of not writing about White people…as though our lives have no meaning and no depth without the White gaze. And I’ve spent my entire writing life trying to make sure that the White gaze was not the dominant one in any of my White books.

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Post Number 40 : The Dying Art of Being Present

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

I recently attended a show which was 20 minutes of non-stop death-defying stunts. Instead of your usual jumps and tricks on bikes and cars, the artists created an interesting storyline and built the stunts around it. There were wheelies done through cars, a ‘Hot-Wheels’ track in real life, bikes rotating in mid-air and a Mortal Kombat styled fight sequence. It was so engrossing! Yet I was so amused at seeing how so many people were more interested in filming it than actually watching it. Was documenting that moment really more important than living it?

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Post Number 39 : Learning to Deal with this Adulthood Thing

Posted on by Candid Wallflowers

I remember being younger and smaller and looking up to people in their 20s with this rose-tinted lens; of hope, of admiration, of wonderment. These people looked so aspirational, so sorted, so aware of who they were and what they did. While I observed them with a glass of Pepsi in my hand, they looked so damn cool discussing ‘office’ with a beer in theirs. Office. It seemed like the be-all-and-end-all at that age. All roads led there. It was to be the outcome of the rigors and pain of filling notebooks and giving exams during school time. Life would be sorted, I was told. Just work hard during school.

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