Tag: stories & meaning
-
I Didn’t Know What to Write Today
I sat down today to write. And for the first time in a while, I didn’t know what to say. Not in the usual way where you have too many ideas and you’re trying to pick the right one. This felt different. My brain would start thinking about something… anything… and then just stop. Like…
-
Some News You’re Never Ready For
I woke up today to several missed calls. That in itself is unusual. Nobody really calls anymore. So when I saw multiple missed calls from a friend, I knew something wasn’t right. Then I saw the message. A WhatsApp image. An obituary. And his face. Ronak. For a few seconds, maybe longer, I just stared…
-
Archie Comics and the Joy of Easy Stories
Why some stories don’t need to be complicated to stay with you. There’s something incredibly comforting about stories that don’t ask too much of you. Archie comics have always been that for me. I grew up reading Archie Double Digests, Jughead Double Digests, Betty & Veronica digests. Piles of them. Dog-eared, shared, reread. You could…
-
Everyday Can Be Day One
2025 has been the most reflective year of my life. Maybe it’s an age thing. Being in your mid to late thirties does that to you. You start looking around and asking questions you didn’t have the patience or courage to ask before. Where is my life actually going?Is this really what I want for…
-
The Show I Never Finished
How I grew up with Friends, but never saw the ending I grew up watching Friends. It was part of the background of my childhood. The jokes, the catchphrases, the endless reruns playing on television at odd hours. It was never something I planned my day around. It was simply always there. Friends played while…
-
Harry Potter and the Stories I Grew Up With
Harry Potter came into my life at exactly the right moment. It was 1999. I was living in Mumbai, and the third book had just come out. I remember hearing about the series, the buzz around it, the way people spoke about these books as if they were something special. I started with Harry Potter…
-
The Movie I’ve Never Seen
The Bollywood classic everyone quotes… except me. There’s a Bollywood film called Sholay.If you’re Indian, or even loosely Bollywood-adjacent, you already know exactly which one I mean. It’s quoted endlessly.It’s sung.It’s parodied.It’s treated like scripture. And me?I’ve never seen it. Whenever this comes up in conversation, the reaction is immediate and dramatic. Shock. Mock horror.…
-
Mandrake, The Phantom, and the Indrajal Comics That Kept Me Reading
Mandrake, The Phantom, and the Indrajal Comics That Kept Me Reading When I think about the comics that shaped me, The Famous Five is not the first memory that comes up. Before that, there was another stack of books that I absolutely devoured: Indrajal Comics. Indrajal Comics were published in India by the Times Group…
-
The Wishing-Chair Adventures and the Books That Started It All
Before The Famous Five, before long series and thicker novels, there were The Wishing-Chair Adventures. These were, as far as I can remember, the very first proper novels I ever read. I must have been around nine or ten. I was living in Mumbai then, and I wasn’t going out much. I used to fall…
-
The Global Citizen Dilemma
Everywhere and nowhere feels like home. Spanish by birth. Indian by origin. Raised across continents. That sentence has followed me for as long as I can remember. It sounds neat when written down, almost poetic. Living it, however, has been anything but simple. I was born in Madrid, a city that still feels stitched into…