i'm in luck, now

just back from lucknow.

a city that i have found more forbidding and forlorn every time i've visited before, since leaving, but not this time.

this time lucknow looked really beautiful.

maybe because i was staying ten minutes away from hazratganj, and its beautiful art deco cinemas.

maybe because behind and beside new buildings, old, gracious british-mughal hybrids, so characteristic of old lucknow, keep peeking out.

maybe because i did a two hour presentation on the 'represenation of muslims in hindi cinema' in the city that, as mukul kesavan puts it, 'is the spiritual home of hindi cinema'.

maybe because i saw 'the rising' in the august company of one of the stars... (well, he had as much screen time as amisha patel...)

maybe because the day after seeing the rising, i was exploring the british residency, under siege in 1857-58.

maybe because i met my first real life Afghan hound...

maybe because aminabad looks so beautiful in the sodium light when you're a little high, and someone else is driving the rickshaw...

maybe becuase everyone i was staying with trashed me in my favourite sport, four letter boggle.

maybe becuase the traffic is so damn awful, i actually look forward to getting back to dodging death on delhi roads...

now i really want to go back....