Explorer of Experiences

In the past two years, I have met some famous and very interesting people in Dubai. It is not everyday after all that you can say you've met the world's happiest man or one of the world's most creative person. So I decided to jot down my brief yet treasured interactions with them, so you can read about it, and I can reminisce a few years down the line. SHASHI THAROOR  [Former Under-Secretary General, UN, Author and Politician] I met Tharoor shortly after I finished a heavy read of his book Inglorious Empire (read my thoughts on it here ) at the Emirates Literature Festival in February 2018. I patiently made my way towards him in a snaking long queue but it was worth it because I even got snapped with him. Tharoor is highly educated, articulate and has an impressive body of social work. But he also has a long list of things he has been criticized for and accused of. Yet, in his numerous TV interviews, I have never seen him frazzled but always patient and calm in ...

Belfast  is the best place to visit in 2018 - Lonely Planet said it, not me.  But why?  Belfast, it was never a city on my must-visit radar, until I met a colleague from there. In the months leading up to my trip, I started researching about the city and learnt that for three decades, Belfast was ground zero of  The Troubles,  a violent territorial conflict over national identity and belonging. The city was fraught with rioting and bombings and was not considered safe. But it's 2018 and on the surface, people in Northern Ireland (part of the United Kingdom) seem to be going about life as usual. Outside of its political and religious issues, Belfast is a beautiful little city, a rising star on the traveler's bucket list, especially in the summer (quick trivia: Belfast usually sees 157 days of rain). My Hosts, The Duncans So there I was landing in Belfast one June morning as a guest of my wonderful colleague (let's call her Ms. Duncan). She is the daughte...

Image source: https://www.motherjones.com/ Did you know... ...Plastic waste takes anywhere between 500-1000 years to degrade. ...50% of the plastic we consume is single-use plastic. ...Only a very small percentage of the tons of plastic that is produced ever gets recycled; most of it ends up in our oceans. That plastic is detrimental to our planet and is already encroaching into our food chain is common knowledge. But have we done much to reduce our contribution to the trash? Despite more and more people becoming aware about the adversities of plastic pollution, so few actually do anything to reduce their plastic consumption. I think the war we are waging is against habit. That old darn habit. Walk into the supermarket, walk out with a can of soda...in a plastic bag... habit. That old darn habit. The other hurdle that companies like Avani  ( founded by an entrepreneur from Bali ) are trying to cross is the cost factor . "The cost of biodegradable cutlery is abou...

This painted mural at the Jallianwala Bagh Memorial depicts the horrors of April 13, 1919 99 years ago on this very day, thousands of innocent Indians were shot and killed by armed British forces in Amritsar, and to date there has been no formal apology from Britain. So what really happened... The ground zero was Jallianwala Bagh. Around 15,000 men, women and children had gathered at this open public space on Baisakhi Day to protest the Rowlatt Act (an Act that empowered authorities to imprison without trial). Upon learning of this gathering, General Edward Henry Dyer rounded up a troop of 50 men armed with 1,650 bullets who were instructed to fire at the chests of the Indians until the last bullet was fired. They sealed the only two exits of the Bagh, then the size of three football fields surrounded by homes. Without any warning, rounds were fired and with all the exists sealed by the troops, to escape the bullets, many died jumping into a well or in t...