Comfortably Numb

Sheila Kumar's Storehouse

Feature: Ilaiyaraaja, Profiled

 Melody`s  Raaja : Ilaiyaraaja Following a six-year hiatus, Ilaiyaraaja is composing for Hindi films again. And as Sheila Kumar discovers, the 63 year-old would rather let his music do the talking. If you’ve forgotten how love, the sensual languor of it, feels like, listen to the music of Cheeni Kam. Three of the four song…

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Feature: Those Noises in the Head could be Tinnitus!

Tinnitus: Noises in the head Tinnitus could be responsible for the incessant noises in your head. But information and determination can help get things under control, writes Sheila Kumar. All of us hear noises inside our heads at one time or the other. For most of us, it is a fleeting phenomenon. But for others,…

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Travel: Coorg, an excerpt

MADIKERI Coffee Nama By Sheila Kumar You’d think a travel agent dreamed up Coorg. Picture this: 2,564 sq km of undulating topography carpeted in every shade of green, wreathed over by a gauzy stole of thin white mist. Bamboo, sandalwood and rosewood forests. Murmuring streams and rivulets, children of the mighty Cauvery, herself born within…

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Travel: Pykara lake, Nilgiris

You wouldn’t know it from looking at the blue-green expanse of water that makes up the Pykara Lake, 25 km northwest of Ooty. The lake looks unfathomably deep — in actual fact, it is 170 feet at its deepest point— a teal-blue expanse, lazy ripples disturbing the smooth surface here and there. Straight ahead, frail…

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Travel: Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh

Orange jalebis in the winter air   Bhopal. Of course, the point is: can one get past the unseen but very-much-felt Carbide shroud, that heinous, diaphanous, brown-stained winding sheet? Then again, it’s not as if Indra Sinha’s Animal confronts the visitor at every turn in the road; it’s not as if the city has forgotten…

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Travel: The Todas of the Nilgiris

Where the buffalo roam     I am scanning his face. Hard. Like everyone who is a temporary or permanent resident of the Nilgiri hills, I have heard all about the Todas. That they are a mysterious people, that their origins, obscured by the mists of time, point variously to the Aborigines, the lost tribe…

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Travel: Sanchi, Madhya Pradesh

Buddha’s Delight Sheila Kumar emerges almost as peaceful as the Enlightened One after a quiet day at Sanchi.     Buddhism has always appealed to me since I’m a sort of middle-of-the-roader myself. Not one to glut on excesses in deprivation or indulgences, I go my way trying to live like a decent human being…

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Feature: Arundhati Rao and her Ranga Shankara

`Shankar would be proud of me“ There is an apocryphal tale of a journalist going to interview Sean Connery just after the actor had doffed the 007 hat. The journo had been told to avoid all mention of James Bond. And, of course, the first thing he asks Connery is: “How are you, Mr Bond?”…

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Feature: Anil Kumble, The Comeback Kid

Kumble, the Comeback Kid Flashback, fall 2000. Anil Radhakrishna Kumble, test spinner, record-breaker (who can forget that perfect 10?), pin-up for women who wouldn`t know a googly from a leg-break, Mr Really Nice Guy, had it all. And then, while playing in Sharjah in October 2000, an Act of God happened. Kumble hurt his shoulder….

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Feature: The Jerry Pinto Interview

‘One per cent writing and 99 per cent rewriting’ Jerry Pinto speaks to SHEILA KUMAR about craft and the catharsis involved in telling the story of a mentally ill mother. Jerry Pinto is a writer who explores  all the avenues of writing that  open before him. His resume  includes teaching mathematics  and journalism, writing television  scripts,…

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