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300,000 Years of Indian History
In his book Early Indians, author Tony Joseph focuses on the ancestral history of the people living in the Indian subcontinent today. Clearly, there is a lot of ground to cover, and the story begins in Africa, 300,000 years ago, where the earliest remains of Homo Sapiens have been found. What happens after that? This…
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Introduction to the Yoga Philosophy
Millions of people practice Yoga all over the world. However, most of them treat it as an exercise routine, without really caring to understand the Yoga philosophy. This is like smelling a cup of coffee and not actually drinking it — nothing wrong with it, just that, you miss the real thing. What is the…
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The Prophet on Eating and Drinking
No, not that one. That would be preposterous. As we only discuss books, here too we are talking about a book called The Prophet. Written by Kahlil Gibran and published in 1923, the book has never been out of print. It has inspired generations of artists, writers, lovers and romantics. The prose-style poetry of it…
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Podcast: Understanding the Israel Palestine Conflict
The Israeli Palestinian conflict is the ongoing struggle between Israelis and Palestinians that began in the mid-20th century. What we are seeing right now, and in the last few weeks, is only a glimpse of its decade-long history. So what is that history? And what is this conflict really about? We discuss all these questions…
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Kanji: The Millennia-Old Rice Recipe
It is called jook or zhou or geng in China, zuk in Korea, chao bo in Vietnam, lugaw in Philippines, okayu in Japan, khao tom gung in Thailand. But its most popular name is of Indian origin – ‘congee’, which comes from the Tamil word kanji. What is it? We are talking about that wondrous,…
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What is Good Writing? Steven Pinker Answers
Every writer, at least in her sane moments, yearns for her prose to be deemed good. Yet, what delineates quality writing from the mundane remains a mystery to many. While instincts often guide our judgements, isn’t there a more defined metric for literary excellence? Or to be more precise, let’s ask ourselves this simple question:…
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Making Tea as per the 8th-Century Holy Scripture in 8 Hours
History may not forgive us for spending such little time and effort on tea-literature when there should be epics and legends written on this celestial nectar. Thankfully, certain Asian cultures will be spared, especially Chinese and Japanese, for they have done their part. So, those of us who love (and sometimes live for) tea must…
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