Magic of Marrakech - I

Where do you get art and culture, crafts and folklore, warm sunshine and cool nights, colorful water bearers and mouth watering sweets, hustle and bustle yet with peaceful oases-like gardens? After much vacillation, Srijith and I picked Marrakech as the destination to celebrate the end of an eventful 2007.

We arrived at Marrakech on a bright sunny Christmas morning – the contrast could not have been starker – from grey wintry Amsterdam to bright sunny Marrakech, from Christmas décor at every street corner to a country which seemed collectively oblivious to the commercialization of Christmas, from bicycles and bakfiets on the streets to mule-driven carriages and old men pulling handcarts.

Marrakech is the capital of Southern Morocco. It was once the capital of all Morocco, a majestic city that could hold its own among the large Moroccan cities of Fes, Meknes, Rabat and Casablanca. The fortunes of Marrakech have risen and fallen over the last thousand years, as it was attacked, dominated, and then lovingly rebuilt by its many conquerors. From the Phoenicians to the Romans to the Byzantines to the Vandals and to finally the Arabs, this Berber metropolis has seen many visitors – wanted and unwanted – and yet managed to retain a culture and tradition that is uniquely its own – a splendid mix of its nomadic Berber roots blended with all that came after.

Something old, something new: Clash between the traditional and the modern

Once upon a time, there lived in Malabar, a kingly state of old South India, a master carpenter known as Perunthachan. He was widely known as an excellent craftsman, with unparalleled genius in architecture and design, and is even today credited for the aesthetic brilliance of many temples and palaces in Kerala. Legend has it that when Perunthachan grew old, there was a severe feud between him and his son, who had by then managed to build up a reputation as an architect in his own right.

Perunthachan believed that the ancient traditions of Vastusastra are too sacred to be modified, while his son had more modern notions of how ancient architectural methodologies and theories could be adapted to better suit the changing times. Versions of the tale also mention that Perunthachan and his son also disagreed on the relevance of caste system in society – the young carpenter was in love with a high caste Brahmin girl and wanted to marry her while Perunthachan strongly resisted it, believing it to be unacceptably antagonistic to age-old traditions. In a rather tragic and drastic ending to the story, Perunthachan is said to have killed his son and thus put an end to this father-son feud.

That is the story of Perunthachan, an old folklore of Kerala that dramatizes the clash between the old and the new. A story that has remained popular even in the current era, as a sign of how the clash between the old and the new is as relevant now as it as has always been.

Most of us would have been confronted with the old versus new question at some point in our lives. If you are from an eastern culture, respect for everyone and everything that has walked or been on the earth longer than you has probably been ingrained into you from the moment you were born. Even in the so-called modern cultures, people cling onto traditions they know and you frequently hear stories of people who have gone to extraordinary lengths in search of their roots. Antiques are usually valued many more times than an object of the same functional value, but with a shorter history to claim. From my own experience, my treasured early childhood memories include curling up next to my aged grandmother, and listening to mythical stories or sometimes, just to the news on the radio. It was not just a grandmother’s love or the excitement of the stories that made those moments special – at some level, I cherish those moments as the only links to a distant past I would never live in or which I can relate to only through words and pictures.

Why, you may ask, do we have this fascination for the old? [...]

Risks in life, an interesting life

Everyone has their risk threshold - even the most devil-may-care risk taker has his or her own limits. Some people draw it earlier, some later.

I think about risks often enough. A couple of years back, I used to be paid to do it. Now I do it more about of habit. So it’s no wonder I was drawn to this piece than someone who calls himself better than your boyfriend (too bad I call my significant other my husband already). Before we get to the risk part, here’s what BTYB calls an interesting life:

“I know, from experience, that I can’t possibly predict what will happen that day. By the end of the day I may be in another city, I may have met a new best friend, I may have found a new hobby, or I may have completely altered the course of my life.“

By his standards, I have a very interesting life - I never know what is going to happen in my life, no matter how risk averse I try to be. It’s an occupational hazard I have come to accept. But I am not sure unpredictability itself constitutes an interesting life. I think life can be so unpredictable that unpredictability itself can be just a predictable boring matter. Nevertheless, an interesting definition - not every day you come across a reasonable attempt at defining an interesting life.

The center of my universe

Some things are never easy, no matter how many times you have said them before. Goodbyes are one of them.

Some things are never said, no matter how easy they should have been. Telling someone that they are the center of your universe is one of them.

The absurdity of life - Excerpts from The Plague by Albert Camus

I just read Albert Camus’ The Plague - Camus being Camus, I was ready for a slow read , but after part I (the book is divided into five parts), I could hardly put the book down. Consequently, I am done - in the literal sense of the word. But perhaps, not really. [...]

Review: Everyman

I still remember the time Philip Roth’s Everyman burst forth into our lives with a huge splurge of marketing and publicity - you couldn’t walk by the city without noticing the book was coming out. After the hype had died down and the paperback had pushed the prices to reasonable levels, but just before the [...]

Review: The Reluctant Fundamentalist

It had been a long time since I had finished a book in one sitting, until I read Mohsin Hamid’s recently published The Reluctant Fundamentalist. It would be easy to attribute it to the rather short length of the novel, but it is much more than that. The narrative makes you feel like part [...]

We are the good guys

Chek out this nice piece in Salon by David Silverman - an honest article about a small typesetter in Iowa going out of business thanks to the jobs outsourced to India
I would love to agree with CNN’s Lou Dobbs that by exporting jobs to India, greedy American corporations are killing independent businesses. I could say [...]

Don’t we love Sarah Silverman!

Don’t we love Sarah Silverman!

Bluffmaster

Bluffmaster, I was called
Placing the cards, that’s all it took
An ace when it should be a king
A queen for a nine
An eight for a ten
A puny two for the regal prince.
Keep a straight face
And no one will ever know
No blink of the eye
No twitch of the brow
No stutter in your voice
With the same rhythm of [...]