Bengalis have a wicked sense of humor — especially when it involves poking fun at themselves. I speak as if I wasn’t a Bengali myself. Truth is that I was born and brought up outside Bengal; so I can’t claim to be a true blue Bengali.
My siblings and I speak Hindi quite well. Our relatives in Bengal did make fun of our broken Bengali infected with Hindi words. Well, in turn we found their attempted Hindi to be hilarious. Continue reading “Bengalis Speaking Hindi”
I admit that quite a bit of my philosophy and convictions come from songs. Or perhaps it’s the other way around: I like songs that fit in with my philosophy and convictions. For instance, my pacifism leads me to songs like “Soldiers who wanna be heroes” and “Gun Shy.” I like “Dust in the Wind” because it accords with my view that the phenomenal world is impermanent.
Songs that tell a story speak to me. Here’s one titled “Sailing to Philadelphia” by Mark Knopfler, who was previously with the band Dire Straits. Continue reading “Mason-Dixon Line”
Of all the amazing phenomena of the natural world, total solar eclipses are my favorite. They are as rare — around one every 100 years at any particular location — as they are spectacular and awe inspiring. The continental US saw a total solar eclipse on August 21st, 2017. (Click on the image above to see the path of totality.)
On August 21st, 2017, I drove to Carbondale, IL, from Chicago, IL to catch that one. Carbondale is called the “Solar Eclipse capital of the US” because amazingly the path of the next total solar eclipse of April 8th, 2024 will also pass through that town in southern Illinois. Continue reading “2024 Total Solar Eclipse”
Atanu Dey : Life is a Random Draw 