The Songbird on my Shoulder

A collection of short spurts of thought which result in the funny, thought-provoking, poignant worldview of a Madam who lives in Pune, India - the Oxford of the East, the Home of the Shrewsbury Biscuit, and the road-accident fatality-and-brain-damage capital of the world.

Showing posts with label Travel. Show all posts

Monday, March 14, 2016

Lucknow Diary

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Basement bonanza It was a Sunday afternoon, and most of the Hazratganj shops were closed. Where were we going to get our mulmul chikan ku...

Sunday, January 24, 2016

Ganga

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So, I was sitting there, watching the river flow by fast And thinking about my dear friend who so suddenly left this earth And wonderi...

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Monday, August 17, 2015

Chile Diary

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First impressions Santiago is a city of parks, water-bodies, sculptures, churches, and a marked European influence. The homes I visited w...

Sunday, August 2, 2015

In Chile, on the Sindhi trail

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Punta Arenas, Chile, is one of the southern-most cities in the world. There was a time when every ship crossing from the Atlantic to the Pa...

Sunday, July 12, 2015

Copper country charm

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Looking back, I realise that as the plane hovered and then started its descent into Iquique, I must have been gawking like a fool. All I co...

Sunday, September 7, 2014

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Return to a Vanished Homeland There are times when you climb into the wardrobe, grope around expectantly, and encounter only its impass...

Friday, May 30, 2014

The red India-Pakistan passport

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In March 2014, after our mother Situ Savur died, my brother Ravi and I had to clear up her things and empty the house she was living in....

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Three-day laugh fest

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I remember how much we wept when we left school! The thought of leaving each other forever was unbearably painful. Would it have helped if ...

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Olympic diary, London 2012

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with Gagan Narang just before Vijay Kumar's silver medal Would we hear the Indian national anthem being played in the Olympic stad...

Thursday, May 7, 2009

Discovering Toronto with Smita

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The low red-bricked houses and neatly-marked streets looked familiar, and with dal and alu-bhindi for dinner, how could anyone blame me for...

Saturday, December 22, 2001

Flights of fancy

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That day, the entire Indian cricket team was on the same flight, and he had managed to get autographs from the lot. The most difficult to a...

Wednesday, April 18, 2001

Tiger chase

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At the gate of the Panna tiger reserve, our jeep driver confided that a tiger had killed an antelope and now lurked nearby. Just the previo...

Sunday, September 24, 2000

Black booty

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I walked through the door of my house, and nearly fainted at the words I heard blaring over the music system. Before I could wonder if I’d ...

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About Me

Saaz Aggarwal: Saaz Aggarwal was born in Bombay on 5 October 1961, so close to Chowpatty Beach that to set sail and embark on a long voyage right away, all she had to do was cross the road. Just as well she didn’t, though, because a motion disorder that caused violent retching even while watching movies shot with a hand-held camera manifested (shortly after the discovery of the hand-held camera). At The Lawrence School, Lovedale, she was dull, unmotivated and an ideal illustration of Newton’s First Law (which states that a body continues to be in a state of rest or uniform motion unless compelled by an external force to change that state). It was further a period when her bushy (and rather splendid) single eyebrow required extensive maintenance with a pair of garden shears. In 1998, the same year in which she was awarded a ‘Best Mumma Ever’ cup as birthday present, Brown Critique, an eminent poetry journal, described her as ‘a well-known Mumbai-based editor and columnist who lives in Pune’ which prompted her to rush about telling people that she was ‘well known’. This blog documents her life as a Madam.

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