Comfortably Numb - Sheila Kumar's Storehouse

Feature: Go Get A New Face!

Go get a new face! In an extension of the look good, feel good, reap good philosophy, young men and women are going under the plastic surgeon’s knife quite heedlessly. One almost wishes this could be dismissed as some crazy one-off fad. But it isn’t. Reports from at least two of India’s metros, Mumbai and…

Travel: Toledo, Spain

A flash of blades It is the dream tourists dream of when thinking of old Europe. Toledo conjures up images of ringing steel, of sabres flashing in a rakish manner. However, there is a lot more to the place…. While Toledo invariably conjures up images of ringing steel, of sabres flashing in a rakish…

Feature: The Treasure That is Tai Chi

People the world over are turning to Tai Chi, an ancient Chinese martial art form, because of its immense health benefits. Let me confess at the very outset: I had always considered Tai Chi to be an exercise for those who had crossed the silver threshold. As I hovered around that very threshold, I joined a…

Travel: La Maison, Kotagiri

Misty heights LA MAISON KOTAGIRI USP: Tryst with Nature He stood at the door of the colonial villa. Some three feet from the ground, pristine white feathers plumped. This red-necked turkey gobbled at us, till our hostess Anne-Helene rushed out of the homestead, La Maison. In some trepidation, we asked if the turkey was being…

Book review: Lessons in Forgetting by Anita Nair

Emotions at centrestage This is Nair’s fourth book and there is no doubt about one thing: she gets better with each one. Lessons… is a reflective, coming-to-terms sort of novel, in which the main protagonists — a former society wife who can wield a mean skillet and a professor of cyclone studies — keep doing…

Feature: There Are Army Wives and Then There Are Army Wives

Throwing a bad fit There is an awkward silence. The small group of women gathered for a coffee morning is staring at one woman. It is her turn and she is refusing to play the game. The game involves peering hard at a set of white powders (from heaps of powdered sugar, cornflour and maida to…

Feature: When Does Indulgence Run out of a Relationship?

It’s a thin line between tolerance and indulgence. Sheila Kumar parses the issue at hand. A successful relationship often has less to do with the number of things we have in common than with the number of quirks we can tolerate — Okay, the quote is from Cathy Thorne’s cartoon, but, it’s no less pertinent!…

Travel: Ladakh, the roof of India

Moonscape Pilgrimage It’s been called the moon desert, Desolation Station, the last outpost. The truth…

Feature : A Gym in Your Garden

A gym in your garden! Take it from one who has learnt the benefits of gardening in the best way possible: me. Some years ago, I moved into a house up in the Nilgiris that was 102 years old and came with more than a half-acre of garden. There were lawns, flower beds, a…

Feature: Making Love Work for You

Making love work A liberal dose of give and take is what will help a relationship last. Okay, you saw each other across a crowded room, you met, dated, fell in love, not necessarily in that order. And now, the two of you get along superbly. You share ideas, emotions, insights. Except colour-coordinating your clothes,…