Grin & Bare It

The six point guide to enriching your Pune experience: 1. When looking to imbibe the true essence of Pune, it is best for one to look out for a couple of local low-lifes to show you around. Preferably ones equipped with transportation, gatorade and a morbid sense of humour. Once they're done with you, Pune's ugly underbelly will never have looked as good. 2. Travelling around Pune is a stress-free experience. There are a few rules to follow though, to ensure your own safety, and that of others. First rule: Never hesitate when looking to switch lanes, or you may confuse fellow motorists and cause an accident. Second Rule: Try not to hit anything. 3. Are you the sort that doesn't fit in? Do you ever wonder if there's anyone out there who's as freakishly weird as you? If the answer to these questions is 'yes' (or if you're fond of yak cheese and coffee cream cake), then German Bakery is the place for you. It is here that one may talk about sex, drugs and ro...

On the occassion of Holi - a post dedicated to the phenomenon that is Colour . My very first box of crayons had exactly six colours in it. SIX. I hadn't learnt to count by then but i wondered nonetheless, how i would ever be able to remember all their names. When i was a little older, my teacher informed me that there existed, in fact, seven colours, all VIBGYOR of them (Not counting black and white, for they are not considered as colours at all). Somehow, to me the concept of how the rainbow was formed seemed a lot simpler than trying to distinguish between violet and indigo. One of my later boxes of crayons had over 30 colours, including at least 5 shades of yellow and 8 shades of blue. It was then that i decided i'd stick to the 7 that i knew and hopefully my life will never depend on having to identify various shades of them. However, i soon realised that this definitely wasn't the case with everyone else i knew, least of all the female species. Women somehow seem to l...

“The hard part about being a bartender is figuring out who's drunk and who's just stupid” - Richard Braunstein Any bartender worth his Bloody Mary should be able to distinguish between the aforementioned categories. The hard part lies in telling apart the various categories of drunks. Now the behavior of a drunk generally has precious little to do with his or her sober avatar. For example, don't be surprised to see your normally stony-faced tough guy friend gaze around benevolently with a dreamy smile and say "I love you guys" after he's consumed 300ml of his favourite beverage. He may just be a sentimentalist. Here's a comprehensive guide that could potentially make the lives of bartenders a lot easier. The Sentimentalist : Generally known to get in touch with his softer side when under the influence, the sentimentalist will talk about his deepest feelings with utmost abandon, Much like if he were reclining on the shrink's couch. Similar to a spiller,...

Somebody once said: "love thy neighbour", and then someone else added "but don't get caught". Well actually, the second part is quite irrelevant to what follows. As you may have guessed, this blog post is dedicated specially to those who live in our vicinity or society, who we may love or hate (in most cases, it's the latter), who we are thrown together to live with and sometimes forced to smile at fakely while passing by. Every building society seems to consist of almost the same collection of people in different forms. Compulsory entities in any society: The group of smaller kids that run around the compound all evening, fall occasionally and scream frequently. The group of older kids that insist on playing cricket in the smallest of spaces between lines of expensive cars. The wicked uncle that will stop them from doing so at any cost. The mothers of the aforementioned kids (younger and older) who gather together to talk about this and that. (read: gossip ...

What do you get when you put together a crowd of tone deaf wierdos, a politically correct set of three obnoxious judges, and a sprinkling of tuneful saviours? Well, anyone watching the intitial auditions of american idol for the first time might well be of the opinion that this is the greatest freak show on earth. This, my faithful readers, is america in all it's pitiful glory. Don't be surprised to see people turning up in front of the judges wearing battle armor, bathrobes, or even entire suits that look like they've been stitched out of an american flag. And you haven't even heard these lunatics sing yet. When out of a crowd of 16000 that turn up for auditions, only 7 make it to the next round, something is seriously WRONG. The saving grace being that it gets a lot better in the later rounds when the aforementioned tuneful saviours are belting it out, and if you're a fan of really good english music, you're in for a treat. needless to say, i love music and i...

this place called mumbai sure is a strange one. i arrived here by train yesterday morning and as i stepped out of the station, i noticed how quaint it really was. firstly, for some inexplicable reason, everyone was fully clothed. i mean, what were they thinking?? doesn't anyone sunbathe topless out here? bring out the bikinis, people! and then, from whatever little i could see of their skin, they seemed to be a shade darker than the reddishly sunburnt caucasian locals in the place i had come from. their tattoos and body piercings seemed to be missing too, or maybe they were hidden under all those clothes. another puzzling aspect of this place was that everyone seemed to be sober. i mean, not even minimally inebriated! i suspect that you're a bit skeptical about my astonishing observations, but yes, this is the bitter truth. bitter....that reminds me, i better pick up some beer on the way home. and some vodka to wash it down. the traffic here seems to be tremendously disciplined...