Column: The Good Life: for Mint Lounge
Saris from Paris: for Financial Times Weekend’s fashion pages
About the Hermes Sari. Appearing here in the Financial Times Weekend fashion pages and pasted below. January 13, 2012 10:05 pm Saris from Paris? By Shoba Narayan French label Hermès has launched a take on the traditional garment and sparked controversy among local designers in India Saris by Hermès At his flagship Calcutta store, fashion designer Sabyasachi Mukherjee is extolling the glories of his new Kanjivaram collection to an adoring clientele. He pulls out silk brocade saris and points out complex weaves and disappearing flower motifs, raving about the nine exclusive weavers he employs in the ancient silk weaving [...]
Comedy Improv
The loser’s guide to comic relief
Profile of Sabyasachi, fashion desiger, for Mint Lounge
Sabyasachi, the revivalist businessman 5 min read . Updated: 06 Jan 2012, 09:31 PM IST The Good life | Shoba Narayan Clad in a khadi kurta-pyjama and Ferragamo flats, Sabyasachi Mukherjee, 37, is having lunch at the ITC Sonar, Kolkata. It is 4pm. We are at the coffee shop. He orders lal maas. I have already eaten. I order jhalmuri. Mukherjee is also a “biryani freak” and will only buy it at Rahmania or Nizam’s for their “sinfully greasy biryanis”. Fish, he says, has to be eaten at home. He tastes myjhalmuri [...]
Chennai’s muse: the Bharatanatyam divas
Chennai's muse: the Bharatanatyam divas 3 min read . Updated: 30 Dec 2011, 09:58 PM IST The Good Life | Shoba Narayan I am going to let you in on a little secret. I don’t know if it is the same in north India, but here in Chennai, where I grew up, everyone has this fixation that revolves around Bharatanatyam dancers. If you have a daughter, you want her to learn this ancient art form that originated with the sage Bharata and his text, the Natya Shastra. If you have a son, [...]
Party Animal?
My Life: negotiating new roles as we age Shoba Narayan Jan 4, 2012 I've noticed a curious phenomenon: men get more introverted as they get older and women more extroverted. I see it in several of my married friends. The husbands want to spend their evenings at home. The wives want to go out. It may be biological. The men have found their mate and see no reason to go out and fulfil their hunter-gatherer duties anymore. All they want to do now is munch on some peanuts or popcorn and watch the game. The women - having fulfilled [...]
Party Animal?
My Life: negotiating new roles as we age Shoba Narayan Jan 4, 2012 I've noticed a curious phenomenon: men get more introverted as they get older and women more extroverted. I see it in several of my married friends. The husbands want to spend their evenings at home. The wives want to go out. It may be biological. The men have found their mate and see no reason to go out and fulfil their hunter-gatherer duties anymore. All they want to do now is munch on some peanuts or popcorn and watch the game. The women - having fulfilled [...]
About Christmas and Inspiration
Christmas inspiration takes a note from many cultures Shoba Narayan Dec 25, 2011 Our largely Hindu community in Bangalore, India, is practising Christmas carols and I am trawling the world for inspiration. I like the majestic rendition of Joy to the World, by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir but I don't like their slower songs. For soulful songs such as Silent Night, I prefer the African American choirs that truly own gospel. I like the Boys Choir of Harlem's jazzy, if untraditional renditions. As for Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, it has to be heard in a church with the majestic [...]
Chateau Margaux and Alain Passard: for Mint Lounge
When your food sings to you So I have a message for Paul Pontallier: Come again to India with your subtle, amazing wines; but next time, dignify our palates by choosing a local chef for the meal The Good Life | Shoba Narayan As we are introduced, Paul Pontallier, the legendary winemaker of Château Margaux, takes my hand, bends down…and kisses it—exactly like Elaine Sciolino describes in her book, La Seduction: How the French Play the Game of Life. I walk in prickly (more about that later) but by the time Pontallier releases my hand, I am charmed. We are at The Leela [...]
Read this and Weep
Read this piece and weep. Pearls Before Breakfast I loved this piece so much on so many levels. It combines art, philosophy, music, behavioral economics, social psychology, pretty much every field that I care about. It gave me names of pieces that I had never hear about: Chaconne by Bach. The greatest violin piece ever written. Gotta listen to that. It gives in one paragraph the various philosophical interpretations of beauty, something which I also care about: Liebniz, Hume, Hume. It gives multiple points of view like that movie, Vantage Point. The musician, the commuter's, the expert's. The choice of [...]
For The National Abu Dhabi on Singapore
From durian to Kampong Glam Shoba Narayan (Writer) Sep 19, 2009 It is 4pm and the Ramadan bazaar in Geylang Serai, the Malay enclave of Singapore, is bustling. Tomorrow is Hari Raya Puasa, the local name for Eid al Fitr and everyone, it seems, is out shopping. Multi-coloured lights twinkle above stalls. Lilting Arab music plays from within. The scent of kaffir lime, lemongrass, galangal, and garlic perfumes the air. Skinny Malay women in colorful sarongs and form-fitting tunics called baju kebaya flit between the stalls. One sells just Middle Eastern dates: sekki, sukkari, medjool, sufri, ajwah and others. Another [...]