Latte with Phoenix

By now we are well into July, and all of us would have spent about four months of Corona induced lockdown; spending time as advised by the medical and other authorities. People in employment, those who run any sort of business and factories have opened; people have started going back to pre-lockdown activities as per guidelines. Restrictions are being reduced and relaxations are being increased, but precautions against Corona have to be practiced for not just several months, but for may be couple of years. There are small lockdowns happening in different states, like in Mumbai and Uttar Pradesh.   Relaxations with Restrictions              Experts say that we have to learn to live with Corona, since it may be with us for long. Everyone is anxious to know the ways and steps which individually we can take so that we remain safe from this infection once we start living our life as ‘normal’? Experts from every field are unanimou...

All of us have experienced three months of Lockdown and have passed through various aspects of life never experienced before. Some were delightful, some troublesome, but all new. These can be recounted as Taking it easy in life, Redistribution of work among members of the household, Leisurely naps in the daytime, Catching up on watching movies on Netflix, Amazon etc; Catching up long pending reading of books, Realising that life can be enjoyed without going out to Malls, restaurants etc. Another aspect was Indoor Games. Of course games like Table Tennis were out of question- for which you had to go out. Simple games like Carrom board, Cards, Snakes & Ladders, Chinese Checkers, Ludo, Chess, etc were needed. The catch was that if you had the particular game board - then good, otherwise it was not available, as all stationery/ toy shops were closed in this lockdown period. My household was in the second category. After playing cards for a couple of days, we wanted varie...

The month of Jyestha/Jeth falling during early May to mid June is eagerly awaited in Lucknow as it holds a special annual event. The occasion is the special Darshan of Lord Hanuman and asking of wishes in the Hanuman Temple at Aliganj, and the accompanying mela.                       The first tuesdayof the month of Jeth has the honour of being known as Bada Mangal. The last tuesday of the month of Jyestha is known as Budhwa Mangal (it could be 4th or sometimes the 5th). The rest of the tuesdays in between do not have any special name. The darshan and occasion are specific to the two temples (old and new) at Aliganj, but with time all Hanuman Temples in Lucknow have started organising similar festivities and mela. May be it is better business sense to do so. Old Hanuman Mandir and its Diety              A brief History …. In the year 1718 Awadh Que...

The Lockdown has completed about 50 days by now. We all faced some problems  in the beginning as it was something new and we were not used to it. Gradually things sorted out and life settled into the new rhythm. Senior Citizens were rigidly told not to venture out in this period. A quick survey has revealed that Senior Citizens can be grouped into three types of living condition in this period. The First group would be those Senior citizens who already had any of their children living with them. This category hardly faced any lockdown problem as their young were with them to handle 'out of house' problems. The Second group would be of people who were living alone but acted fast and called their children from other cities whether studying or in jobs to come back home. Senior citizens living in this group had a jolly good time. There were two or three  generations living together after a long time for such a extended period. Younger children enjoyed the c...

Adjective as product naming is a topic which is being regularly discussed around the world. But it remains more of a academic discussion only.  In this entire race for more business, there is a category of manufacturers who have adopted a different rout. They have simply adopted a tactics which tries to plant in the consumer’s mind that their product is of a special class. They have simply named their product on English adjective words which give a different meaning to that product. Consumer product companies, Marketing Managers and Advertisement companies care two hoots for the discussion which tries to show that such a naming is unethical. The market is flooded with products having adjective as brand names, such as Real, Natural, Orange, Pure, Fresh and Achcha to name only a few. Take the product named “Real”. It is a brand name of a purported fruit drink. The name tries to imply that it has real fruit juice packed in it and nothing else. In reality it has ...