Month: December 2025

Posted in Indian Art Culture Music

What a veritable online feast… December/Margazhi Music Festival of Chennai

Posted on by veeskitchen

As an NRI i get to watch only the online kutcheris as the Margazhi/December Music festival is in full bloom in Madras/Chennai. But whatever is available is already plateful and even this I am unable to consume wholly! Simply no time and then there is the time zone difference. Today for instance they were all the same time – Sri Rangam Venkata Nagarajan, Prince Rama Varma, Dushyanth Sridhar everyone. Stunning range to cater to all your senses, most overwhelming that we have to choose and ration time. Thanks to webcasters I am enjoying the treat from the confines of my home from OUTSIDE INDIA. I am in particular tuned in to Mudhra and Madhuradhwani and Ragamalika tv to who I want to give credit. They lend a class to our lifestyle so effortlessly! Great job! Feel refreshed totally and recharged. Soul stirring instrumental music without whose mention the post shall be incomplete. This is true of both solos/duets as well as accompaniments. My pick of the season: Amrutha Venkatesh. Soon the classical dance programs are to start – from Bharat Natyam and Kuchipudi to Kathak and Mohiniattam. Carnatic season is including healthy share of discourses (Upanyasams) this year. Of course this trend is seeing a steady rise in recent years. Love listening to newbies who all seem to be outperforming. Young talent is new blood, that longstanding cultural traditions need to be necessarily infused with year after year. Not that I am a pro in anything. Just a connoisseur of good music – music understandable to me , which is why western is ruled out for me. I enjoy anything/everything desi be it classical or folky and ofcourse filmy. You don’t need to know the a,b,cs of the classical to savour the best of it. You don’t have to be a qualified all-knowing rasika at all. Just relax and go with the flow, enjoy the sensation. That is the beauty of the Indian classical musical renditions be that vocal or instrumental. The bhakthi component is indispensable to Indian classical. As much as I love the Thyagaraja keertans, I am also at the same time partial to Muddhuswamy Dikshithar’s kirtans. Favourite composers include Papanasam Sivan (for Tamil renditions), Gopalakrishna Bharathi among others.

Soul-soothing, soul calming, soul enriching, soul awakening: this is how I describe God given gift of classical musical forms of India: Carnatic (of the south) and Hindustani (of the north). Not very familiar with Hindustani though but I have to thank RaGa sisters for introducing us audience to a slice of the spread with selective Abangs.

This is why retired life in India is BEST. Classical music, looming ancient temples that are over 1000-2000 years old spread over hundreds of acres, fresh flowers, monsoon madness, life-throbbing cities and small towns and dusty villages besides the variety of regionwise authentic matchless cuisine. No other nation on earth can come even a close second. Heat and crowd and mosquitoes are small incoveniences. You don’t burn the house to get rid of a pest. Of course, you settle for other pleasures when you don’t have to bother too much about your soul. SOUL FOOD: this you get only in India.

Jai Bharat. Hindu Dharma ki jai.

Posted in History-Culture, Indian Art Culture Music

This is why I stopped shopping at Farida Gupta

Posted on by veeskitchen

FG is my favourite brand and I have an account with her. But she got on my nerves repeatedly referring to Diwali as ‘festival season.’ I stopped shopping at her totally. I still look at hers sometimes but I know I will never again shop with her UNLESS SHE REFERS TO DIWALI AS DIWALI. And apologize for even unwittingly committing a mistake. You don’t send me season’s greetings for Diwali. You greet me PROPERLY ‘Happy Deepavali.’ You refer to sale as proper DIWALI SALE. You refer to Oct-Nov as Diwali season or (Navratri) Puja season or Dusshera season. Or simple, fold up your business, QUIT INDIA and start a boutique in downtown Dubai. GOOD RIDDANCE. We need to get rid of this kind of so-called benign tumours first. This is what shall later develop as malignant cancer. No, none of these manipulators are secular.

There are even more sinister attempts to secularize Diwali in some quarters by NON REFERRING THE FESTIVAL BY NAME AND REFERRINNG TO IT AS ” FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS’ OR EVEN ‘JASHN E RIWAZ’ . The nerve. We need to address this kind of cultural onslaught on warfooting basis.

Today in news is the London Khan trying to similarly remove Christmas from the celebrations. You tube has videos.

Now Diwali aka Deepavali is declared as an intangible world heritage by UNESCO. Its celebrated from time immemorial, from the day Ram and Sita returned to Ayodhya from Sri Lanka, literally in another plane of time. Fireworks were in full display welcoming them as Valmiki Ramayana mentions. Organic though.

https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/deepavali-02312

This move also serves to authenticate the history antecedents and cultural roots of Hindus dating back by some 10,000 years (even if we need no certificate from any authority whatsoever).

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/historic-moment-as-diwali-makes-it-to-unesco-list-deepavali-joins-yoga-durga-puja-among-intangible-cultural-heritage-full-list/articleshow/125883637.cms

DIWALI/DEEPAVALI IS PROBABLY THE WORLD’S OLDEST/MOST ANCIENT FESTIVAL THAT IS IN CONTINUUM UNTIL THIS DATE. JAI SHRIRAAM. May Ram Rajya return to India to eternity.

Posted in Books

The one and only book that matters: ‘Autobiography of a Yogi’ by Paramahamsa Yogananda.

Posted on by veeskitchen

Its a shame although I have known for years or perhaps decades, and that too being an ardent, born and practising Hindu, I still finally got to read this lifechanging book only very recently. Reading for months now from my desktop Kindle. About to finish. Who am I to even review God’s own writing. This book is not fictional and this book is for those who are born outside the Hindu India to understand about the Hindu philosophy/Hindu Dharma. Why, even all of us Indians could make the best use of Shri Yogananda ji’s excellent autobiography – the kind of which I have not come across so far. Not that I am a voracious reader. Being part of the Hindu society makes most things familiar to me. Still the book holds my interest totally and I kind of don’t want it to end. I have been reading rather slowly for that reason. REason for my slow reading is that, if I finish a book fast i forget it in a flash whereas slow reading helps me retain the subject matter for long.

Anyway, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. Nothing more to add. Except that, in this dry desert that is my second residence, I experienced a total of 6 rain draps in a span of 2 weeks. 3 rain drops during a walk before national prayers were called for rain. That when I checked with my spouse who was walking besides me was refuted by him that I began doubting myself. As if to confirm my doubts, the week after the national prayers, 3 more subtle rain drops fell on me. Both the times, as it is my practice, I was chanting the Lalitha Sahasranama in my mind. I chant Sahasranama always in my mind while I go for walks. For me, IT WAS LALITHA ANNOUNCING HERSELF TO ME. Just cool 3. No more raindrops. Nobody else felt them. Just 3 + 3 = 6 that grazed my skin so softly, so feebly ,and that too the first one caressing my crown – my scalp. The beauty of faith. I leave it anyone who reads this to believe this or not. But I don’t have to be reading Yogananda ji to believe in my Lalitha. I am enjoying Her subtle leela with me for years now. Very recently She gave me another unbeatable vibe. A stone is a stone if that is what you believe in. An idol becomes God when you believe God dwells in the stone.

Blessed to be born a Hindu, blessed to have been born in my punya bhoomi Bharat (India). My birth is probably REQUESTED. Souls ask to be born in my country. Evolving of faiths happens only with the arrival of the Avatars. Only Hindu Dharma has been NON STOP producing saints and avatars, hundreds and even thousands of them, for centuries and centuries now.

Before I close this post, I add one incident from a friend’s life story. Her name was Bindhu. She was my bosom school friend’s sister. We met almost everyday at school. We drifted apart. She moved to her native state Kerala. Worked for a central government department. Became a mother to two beautiful daughters. Just into her 40s, she was afflicted with kidney cancer. Died within 3 months. But Bindhu was a follower of Sri Sri. She had completed her entire course of Art of Living and had perfected a particular breathing (Yoga) technique. As the course progressed, she was becoming detached from everyone. The course seemed to have brought in a change with her. Before she passed away, she told her sister that she was peaceful, she did not fear death as she kept seeing her last 7 births then for sometime or ever since she was bedridden (for a week’s time). That made her accept her current role and her current body as temporary abode. Her sense of attachment at that point of time sounded shocking to her parents and family. Her sister and my best buddy until today, was stunned. I am using original names here. Once she was detected with kidney cancer at an advanced stage and was not given any hope, Bindhu went to see Sri Sri for one last time. Gurudev paused for a moment at a distance and looked away it seems. HE KNEW without being told – that’s what my friend says. And Bindhu accepted her destiny. After hearing this real life incident, I think of the mahans, India is producing even today. Sri Sri – for the first time in my life, I want to listen to his speeches and follow his Art of living. As I have already chosen a path to nurture my spiritual instincts, I am hesitating that’s all. All this I am saying, happened just 15 years back. This is the beauty of my holy Bharat.

You missed something so precious and unmissable in your life, if you don’t read this book. So, it goes without saying that there is no excuse of any Hindu skipping it or missing it. I am too late but better late than never.

At the back of my mind is always the omnipresent Lalitha. Its like I cannot shake Her out of my system. She is there behind my thoughts and actions; behind my every second. The books has widened my horizons of thoughts.

The swamijis of the last century: Shirdi Baba, Ramana Maharishi, Ramakrishna Parahamsa, Swami Vivekananda, Shri Lahiri Mahasiya, Shri Yuketeshwar, Shri Yogananda Parahamsa, Shri Ananda Moi, Sri Aurobindho …. the list goes on and on and one.

Even in present times we have the Siddhas and great swamijis in our midst in India. Sai Baba of Puttabarthi is no more. His centenary anniversary was held very recently. Hindu dharma is the only faith in the world that has been producing avatar after avatar for millennia.

May Dharma prevail to eternity. Sanatana Dharma ki Jai (Hail Hindu Dharma)!

Posted in Economic

Is there oversupply of paper gold as against limited real physical gold ?

Posted on by veeskitchen

Digital gold needs no intro: it is the most happening investment in world markets today making headlines for months now. There is however reportedly, an oversupply of paper gold or digital gold in the world for a while, than actual physical gold in circulation, a point missed by most of us retail investors. Trading/holding stocks in digital gold has made this possible. Holding digital gold is also hassle-free than physical possession. It is said that the ratio of paper gold to physical existing gold in the world could be as skewed as 100:1 or even 250:1. So could this bubble burst anytime crashing the gold markets one fine day? With not enough real gold to back up the digital gold, it is possible that the world economy could be heading towards a crash so far as gold market is concerned. Probably that is why, those like Warren Buffet allegedly keep off digital gold. Digital gold could be a good short term investment than a long term plan, it is said. ETFs seem to be the most favoured platform of gold investment. Owning the physical gold is still the safest way as we know because we are in direct possession of the actual gold that can be stashed away in a vault.

What do I attribute to digital gold working? I, as an Indian housewife, am used to hoarding gold as traditional practice, and don’t fear the fall of the gold prices. But it is true that we women in India hold actual gold in our hands, how much so ever minimum could that be. For us, gold is LIQUIDITY that is matchless. Gold is economic freedom. And gold appreciates maximum, next only to real estate. All these factors make gold the most favoured investment for us ladies. If gold has to crash, then the bubble has to burst in every sector should loans be recalled at short notice, for that matter. World economy will collapse. Just recall housing loan enmasse and see what happens. Domino’s effect. Like a pack of cards, everything has to come crashing in that case. Reality is never the point in the world of economics. How do credit cards work then? Is gold the only bubble waiting to burst? Nations borrow heavily. But I do understand the need to cap the gold market at some point of time. As someone who is in the line of investment averred, gold is not a productive investment and therefore its growth is unnatural. Stocks normally boom when the productivity index improves and quarterly reports show good results. Gold however obeys no such laws. Very much akin to real estate, gold appreciates in value only because of the superficial demand its scarce availability manages to create as against its actual supply. Having said that, a humble housewife/grandma here with no compatible background to post such a comment! But I take the liberty with my half baked info/knowledge!

Can digital gold be realized into real gold? I observed this from a couple of Indian banks. First of all even the leading ones did not have the digital gold platforms that sold 24 k gold gram by gram (or ounce by ounce). ETFs/Gold funds were on offer. But there was this one bank that sold digital gold for a few months which on demand was stated to be deliverable at your doorstep. Product withdrawn from bank services with November end, no wonder! The digital gold sale by ounce did not even last a good six months! Probably the reason is that the bank feared inability to keep up with real supply on demand from customers. However, I see that digital gold sale ounce by ounce is still on offer by a few digital platforms and jewelry houses. The jewelry houses in India cleverly state that your digital gold can be acquired only as gold coins or jewelry from their premises! Well, that means, you can never encash your digital gold at these jewelry houses! In short, by investing in digital gold in these jewelry houses, you are only paying in installments/lumpsum for your future gold purchases! Govt of India and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) do not regulate these platforms trading in digital gold and therefore investment in these platforms may remain risky.

As I see, the govt of India that was issuing sovereign gold bonds for years has since withdrawn the bond issuances from last year! The big headache of paying off the maturing bonds in near future awaits the Indian govt!

Any other info I may glean, I shall update here with.

What do I think about middle class investments in digital gold. I think if you can take the risk, you can afford to invest in digital gold. It still is a great investment – long term investment in my PERSONAL opinion. Its worth the risk, provided you have other investments to bank on, in case of an unprecedented crash. So far world has not witnessed such a debacle, but let us wait and watch.