Deepa's Jottings

On the 24th of April, 2019, as I passed the IIM-B/HSBC junction in a bus, I found this elderly gentleman working very hard to direct traffic. He was working with a smile, which is not usual for any traffic policeman around that time of day, 9am, which is peak traffic and congestion time. I was definitely struck by his enthusiasm and cheerfulness, so I wondered if the Traffic Police are enlisting the help of volunteers? I would certainly like to know...and to thank this particular gentleman for stopping my bus driver, who was creeping forward, with a smile...whether or not…

There are two unconnected areas where I see unethical and unchecked profiteering going on; I came across one because of having to buy two sets of books, notebooks and other school materials for my grandchildren, and the other, when I made a rare visit to a mall with friends. Schools should practice what they preach, and recycle books from one set of students to the next set who follow them. But instead of doing this, they make a package deal of books, notebooks and art and craft material, which it is mandatory for parents to buy. I think the total…

On the butterfly group that I belong to, one member told us about the Bear Rescue Centre (BRC) at Bannerghatta, and asked for volunteers.It was then decided that several of us would visit the Centre and then decide on who would be able to volunteer. Since the Centre personnel wanted only 15 participants in each group, two groups of 15 members each were constituted. One group visited on Saturday, the 16th of March, and the other on Saturday, the 23rd of March. I was with the second group, and my anticipation was not disappointed. The visit to the Centre, which…

It is not a common occurrence for me to be able to watch a well-made promo video of a theatre school; I did that for the first time when I reached out to the Drama School Mumbai, and the programme coordinator, Neeraj Panchal, sent me the video, which you can see here I noticed the words "Annual Student Production 2018-19" on the excellent brochure that was given out before, and about, the play This intrigued me and I found out that the play was staged by the students of this school; some of them told me, after the play, that…

Since all of us are becoming so polarized by caste these days, I thought I would take a tongue-in-cheek look at the four varnas, or castes, into which I can categorize the living beings around us. No offence meant, this is a light-hearted classification, intended to drive home the point that dividing ourselves by "caste" is not a good thing to do! The Brahmins of the "upper caste" is easily represented as there are several creatures with the word in their name. Here is the Brahminy Kite: See the beauty of the Brahminy Skink: There is also the Brahminy Myna…

"The Emperor of All Maladies", a Pulitzer-winning book by Siddharth Mukherjee, is an intense book about that dreaded "C" word...cancer, and looks at the dread ailment via multiple lenses...history, biography, describing the several discoveries, obstacles,triumphs and failures in humanity's long journey with, and battle against, cancer. To base a play on a book like this is a major challenge, and Bangalore Little Theatre rose up to that challenge with their play, which I watched at Ranga Shankara on the 27th of February, '19. The theatre group had produced an excellent brochure, which described the play. I skimmed through it, wanting…

It had been quite a while since I went to Ranga Shankara for a play, and the blurb about "Bali" was interesting enough to pull me in. Here's the quotation from the excellent brochure that was handed out before the play: "Adishakti's Bali is a retelling of the various events that lead up to the battle between Bali and Ram and eventually, the death of Bali. The play explores the notion of right and wrong, and how it may change when each and every character is given an opportuntiy to voice their thoughts and opinions." With this intriguing introduction, I…

For a while now, the world of insects and spiders has begun to be revealed to everyone, through the medium of photography. As the micro-sized creatures are captured through macro photography, stunningly weird-looking creatures appear on social media feeds, making us feel that these, surely, are beings from a different planet! No, these creatures are not "out of this world" at all. It's just that their tiny size prevents us from seeing them in detail. Another reason why we know little about them is that they are often so well camouflaged, as leaves, bark, or other natural phenomena, that we…

We have several group for senior citizens in our city, but today (16 Jan,2019) I attended a meet of senior citizens...the common factor between them being that their children are living in Portland, Oregon, in the western seaboard of the USA! The group, all of whom are on WhatsApp, is called "PDX BLR Friends", and is an offshoot of "PDX Seniors" in the city of Portland. The venue chosen for the morning meet was another "senior" of Basavanagudi, Vidyarthi Bhavan, which has existed since 1943. I spoke to Sri Venkatesh Rao, who had used the Metro to arrive at the…

It's always a tug-of-war on the second Sunday of every month. I have learnt a lot on the Lalbagh walks, but since I am generally committed to the 3rd and 4th Sunday walks, I do like to go to other birding spots with my friends. Well, on the 13th of January, the tug was decided by the fact that the Asian Waterfowl Census, or AWC ) is on, and we could contribute data and pretend to be very scientific, while following the experts around and getting to see a lot of birds! So off we went to Hoskote kere, after…