Mumbai Coffee House

Scene 1: I had gone to pay local taxes at a government office in Bandra a few days back. I was directed to a table where there was no-one else waiting. I went up to the officer at the desk and submitted our papers. He keyed in the details in to his computer. The results flashed immediately. I gave our cheque, so far so good. Then the officer pointed out that the cheque was Rs 12 (twelve) more than what was due. We looked at each other and tried to figure out what has to be done. Suddenly an elderly corpulent gentleman came and sidled up and stood beside me. I waited a for a couple of seconds. I thought he might have a question for the officer. I looked at the encroacher. He smiled at me. There was no-one behind me and yet he stood beside me. I looked at him and said, 'do you mind standing behind me? We are discussing something here.' He smiled at me and said, 'no problem, I will wait.' I drew my breath and said, 'can you please stand in the queue while we...

Yesterday I came out of a meeting about a new media vehicle which is yet to establish itself in India.  The possibilities sounded interesting though. The owner of the company told me about the growth of this media in the US. I listened to his reasons for believing that it has potential in India too. The reasoning sounded interesting.  I thought about our chat after I went home. I was keen to know more about this medium.  Then I happened to go on Instagram then and suddenly saw a live story from my cousin there. She has just graduating from the NYU in New York. She often puts up examples of her design work on Instagram. That's when I remembered that media studies were part of the seemingly complex course that she had done. By 'complex', I mean a course that seemed more fluid than the Sociology or Literature or Physics or Geology Hons of my time in college in Kolkata. I suddenly got the the idea to reach out to her to know more about what we had discussed ...