Little gestures of bonhomie and small acts of kindness leave lasting memories. They are what one takes back home and remembers while reminiscing about a given sojourn.

Jo’burg, or Jozi, taught me a lot of lessons. This changed my perspective towards life immensely. I was a totally different person on my return to India — calmer, spiritually aware, more respectful towards my parents, and, in a nutshell, “grown-up!”

Our rivers remain symbolic of the purifying quality of water and flowing water, in general. Like fire, flowing water is believed to be a natural purifying element, containing intrinsic powers, especially when in motion.

Almost 80 per cent of us spend far too much time “thinking” our way to failure. Thinking for the sake of thinking, or for the sake of what is, or went wrong in the past, is no good — this kind of thinking does not reveal the properties that trigger and ignite our burning desires and solidification of beliefs systems.

P G Wodehouse not only beats Noble laureates and Booker Prize-winners hollow, but also a host of great writers — in any genre.

Shankar-Jaikishan were exceptional. The power of their melodies evoke a distinctive feeling, replete with a perpetual velvety feel — of fragrance as everlasting as musk. This isn’t all. Their sophisticated luminosity, juxtaposed by swanky changes, in tune with the tides of time, or what people wanted, never ever lost its distinguished feel — you’d know S-J’s melodious benchmark and eternal appeal at the “drop” of a song. Most importantly, there’s an innate sense of transcendent divinity running through their compositions — like the eternal beating of the waves of the ocean, or the insidious blooming of a flower. A tribute.