e Magus

Have you uploaded your photograph, reimagined in the grainy, sepia toned glow of the 1980s, onto social media? Congrats! You are now part of millions who queued up and are still queuing up to be aged backwards by an algorithm, all in the name of a little harmless fun. And it was fun. It always is, in the moment. But have you ever given it a thought on what’s happening underneath the filter, something our very human, very forgetful brains are not quite built to notice. We are, all of us, terrible at holding on to things. We forget names within seconds of being introduced, we recognise a face across a crowded room and cannot place it. This gap, between knowing of someone and truly knowing them, is one of the oldest and most forgivable of human failings. It is also, it turns out, the one thing that machines have been patiently waiting for us to close. For years now, the platforms we live with have been collecting the parts of us that don't need a face — what we like, what we fear, w...

A friend asked me the other day, “Since you are working remotely, what is the one thing you miss most about working from an office?” In jest, I replied, “Using—and hearing—the bad words.” Having spent many years in the advertising industry, I lived in an environment where our daily conversations had very few filters. Brainstorming rooms, office corridors, coffee and smoke breaks, late-night deadlines—these were spaces where the so-called forbidden four-letter words, along with their far more colourful Hindi counterparts with elaborate familial references, flowed with ease. They were not always expressions of anger. More often than not, they signalled excitement, disbelief, frustration, admiration or simply emphasis. A creative idea could be described as “bloody brilliant” in one breath and torn apart with equal linguistic intensity in the next…with a combination of same word.   Nobody paused to take offence. The words, stripped of much of their literal meaning, functioned almost li...

A few weeks ago, manifestation began manifesting itself in my life. It first appeared during the parents orientation at my son's school. Apart from the usual academics, values and future readiness, the principal also spoke earnestly about manifestation. A few days later, an actor in a magazine interview attributed much of her success to it. Then came the inevitable WhatsApp forward, delivered with the confidence usually reserved for medical advice and stock market predictions. Three encounters in two weeks felt statistically significant. Either manifestation was everywhere, or it had decided to manifest itself specifically before me. Manifestation, is the belief that by focusing your thoughts, intentions and emotions on a desired outcome, you can attract it into your reality. Think positively, visualise success, align your energy with your goals, and the universe, apparently, begins making arrangements on your behalf. But this idea is surprisingly familiar. The urge behind manifest...

Like every year, our festival of Vishu arrives on April 14th. When we were kids, Vishu meant two or three things: early morning firecrackers, Vishu kaineettam, and the sumptuous sadya that followed. But the central activity revolves around the Vishu kani. Late on the previous night, long after most of the family members have gone to sleep, the women of the family would still be awake assembling the Vishu kani. The brass uruli would be brought out and polished until it caught the lamplight. A kolam would be drawn, and rice, fruits, vegetables from the harvest, flowers, a mirror, a lamp, jewellery, Puranas,  currencies, new cloth, and the image of Krishna would be placed with care—as if abundance itself were being composed into a still life. Before sunrise, everyone in the household would see this arrangement as their first sight of the day, a moment of bounty and beauty. By evening, however, everything would disappear. If one thinks about it, we Indians seem remarkably comfortable p...

This post somehow is an extension of my earlier blog, For Ol’ Times’ Sake , written after meeting former colleagues at a reunion. I found myself thinking about the curious role memory plays in our lives, and one thought led to another. It was slightly unsettling to find out that the memories we revived that evening were from twenty or thirty years old. Yet, if I were to look at the last 15 years of my life, or even recent months…the recollections seemed strangely thinner. It was not that nothing had happened. If anything, life has been busier than ever. Yet somehow the experiences did not feel as firmly lodged in memory. This made me think, are we creating fewer memories today, even though we are having more experiences? For example, let’s take music. I keep listening to Spotify or the local FM station in my daily commute. I tried remembering which was the most popular song that I would heard a number of times last year. Nothing stood out. Try this out for yourself, if you can recall… ...

Last week, I attended a get-together of former colleagues from the Times of India Hyderabad office. For me, and many of us, it had been more than two decades since we had last worked together. The day had all the ingredients of a good reunion—food, music, drinks, laughter, and the slightly awkward but warm ritual of rediscovering faces that had once been part of everyday life. The event had been wonderfully organised by a group of enthusiastic volunteers ( Murthy Vadapalli , Ranjana Rudra , Suresh Kochattil , Navneet Mathur Padmini Kashyap and many others) who had put in the effort to track people down, coordinate schedules, and make the day happen. And judging by the smiles, the hugs, and the decibel levels in the room, their effort had clearly paid off. A big shout out to all the amazing folks! As I wandered around the venue reconnecting with people from my past, it struck me that most of us were not there merely because an invitation had been sent. We were there because of somethi...