The Sunday Haul

Flipping through the glossy pages of yet another issue of the Conde Nast Traveller (July 2010 issue) that I found at Abids this Sunday I suddenly realized that I could perhaps be the only reader of the magazine who hasn’t been to any of the places written about in it. The problem with Conde Nast Traveller is that it features the sort of places not many government blokes like me can afford to visit without breaking the bank. Anyway, on the other hand, I feel I should consider myself lucky that I am finding the magazine and its latest issues even, quite regularly and getting to read all about those places I cannot ever dream of visiting. Of course, being in government service I can’t unless some publisher decides to accept my first novel and agrees to pay me a jaw-dropping sum as advance.

I do not know why but once I find Conde Nast Traveller I find it again and again. I found the July 2010 issue this Sunday even before I could finish reading the August 2010 issue that I had found last Sunday at Abids. I had also seen a stack of the same magazine (but these were of 2009) the other day at the Landmark sale and they were selling at fifty rupees each. In the July 2010 issue I found Mumbai is featured once again as if there is no other place in India worth a visit. If not for the Charminar or Golconda I feel that people should visit Hyderabad to see for themselves how wonderful drivers we Hyderabadis are.

After Dave Barry and Bill Bryson one humor writer I discovered is David Sedaris. I had found his ‘Me Talk Funny One Day’ long back at Abids and liked his humor enough not to lend the book to anyone. This Sunday I came across another of his books- ‘Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim’ and bought it for sixty rupees. It is a book of humorous essays which is one form I love to read. The book got some pretty impressive reviews and here are some:

‘The hilarious new collection from the funniest man on the face of the earth.’ – New York Post

‘The essays are sardonic, funny, and wry, but at the same time… that attest to the author’s evolution from comic writer to full-fledged memoirist’- that from the famed critic Michiko Kakutani of New York Times.


‘You’ll be on the floor laughing once the twisted mind of David Sedaris has its way with you.’- Marie Claire

I guess that’s enough to get all those who missed this book at Abids start burning. The last item in the Sunday Haul I made at Abids is a book completely at odds with the previous find. A hardcover edition of ‘The Best Short Stories of Dostoesvsky’ is what I found and got for only forty rupees which is a steal considering it has seven stories filling up 297 pages. These are the stories in it- White Nights, The Honest Thief, The Christmas Tree and a Wedding, The Peasant Marey, Notes from the Underground, A Gentle Creature, and The Dream of a Ridiculous Man along with an Introduction by the translator David Magarshack.

So far in my short reading life I haven’t read anything about Dostoevsky though I am well aware that he is one of the greats. I remember picking up ‘Idiots’ for Hari a long time back and I haven’t heard about it from him afterwards. Maybe he is still reading it because I also remember that it was the sort of thick and heavy book that takes months to finish. Anyway, I hope to get started on the short stories in TBSSD someday if only in the hope of being brought down to earth because these days I am having too many dreams about fat advances.

Tzatziki Again

It was in an issue of Conde Nast Traveller (which has done more to my knowledge of exotic food than anything else) that I first read about ‘Tzatziki’ which is a Greek dish. Not very long ago I came across ‘Tzatziki’ in a book of short stories (Good Bye Harold, Good Luck) by Audrey Thomas. Last Sunday I read about the dish again in Vasundhara Chauhan’s delightful column in the magazine section of ‘The Hindu.’ Next time I come across it I hope it will be on a plate.