A Curated Guide to Slow Living in India
I have lived the past month shrouded in the swirls of dust that have enveloped Delhi. The smog never seemed to disperse. So, the opportunity to visit a manicured oasis in the heart of the city, a palpably green wonderland, was naturally a draw for …
In times of self-quarantine, work from home and self-distancing, it gets very easy for our daily living activities to get out of whack. Dr Sharad Kulkarni, the inhouse doctor of Kama Ayurveda, tells beejliving.com how to establish balance and understanding practices that promote healthy living.
Sumitra Daswani is the founder of Born From The Earth – a natural healing company – and is a holistic health practitioner, trained in Ayurveda, medical botany, nutrition, meditation and sound therapy. She guides others on how to heal themselves naturally and achieve optimal well-being. She writes about her journey to becoming a healing practitioner and how everyone has the innate capacity within themselves to to heal.
I have a box of letters hidden in my cupboard. Crumbly papers shoved in faded envelopes, and lots of misplaced nostalgia occupy space. I have none of the letters I wrote. The art of retrievement of a letter you send to someone is akin to …
An emotional revival of Indigo whose vibrancy is as illustrious as its history In the summer of 1859, ryots or peasants in Bengal refused to grow Indigo for European planters who had imposed exploitative and oppressive conditions on them. Neel Bidroha or the Indigo revolt …
Working through the lock down with an ethical jigsaw puzzle The first few months of being locked up at home were akin to life crawling by in slow motion. Time, once so scarce, was piling up in minutes, hours and days. The minutes ticked by …
A hair care routine I’ve finally settled into after much trial and error Hair brings one’s self-image into focus; it is vanity’s proving ground. Hair is terribly personal, a tangle of mysterious prejudices. – Shana Alexander The most freeing thing I’ve ever done in my life …
In our fifth column in the series of reimagining a conscious future, Yash Dongre – Business Head – House of Anita Dongre Limited speaks to BeejLiving about balancing social impact with commerce. The fashion house is nearing the magical figure of a nearly 1,000 stores across the globe under …
Wild yeast has become wildly popular during the pandemic. For years I’ve been following Anita Tikoo’s Instagram account a_madteaparty chronicling her sourdough journey using lively wild yeast starter and local flours and other culinary experiments. A practicing landscape architect, she grows seasonal produce on her …
I have a box of letters hidden in my cupboard. Crumbly papers shoved in faded envelopes, and lots of misplaced nostalgia occupy space. I have none of the letters I wrote.
The art of retrievement of a letter you send to someone is akin to stealing. It was sent by you, it contains a part of you, but it’s not meant for you.
Instead, I have replies with which I can piece together my own life, snippets of it which I glean from polite responses.
My grandfather’s are breezy responses to my childhood regurgitations. The gentle chastising of my teachers who lost my notebook. The pat on my back for my joyous descriptions of my holiday to Dalhousie. The warm encouragement that my messy handwriting was improving. The gentle reminder to study since I was in the final year of school and rather than writing letters, I should be burning the midnight oil.
Then those of my best friend, who relocated seven seas away. Letters of apology for not writing too often. But always with a valid reason. Responses that over the years showed the widening chasm in our lives. Me here; she there. And a whole world of fading memories in between.
What’s it about letters that stirs something in our hearts? That warm feeling of ripping the envelope open and rifling through the pages.
Delicate onion paper, sometimes scented. A gliding ink pen, like my grandfather used. Signing off with a flourish. The slow scrawl of life.
Letter writing is a tender art form.
Its a repository of feelings that you’re sharing with only another person. It’s the most intimate form of communication in the past. What you’ve penned to paper, sealed and sent, can never be erased. It is to remain till the sepia-tinted papers crumble away.
