“Dogs are allowed in the regular elevators, but workers must take the service elevator. Does this mean we’re less than animals?” nolina minj reports on the lift apartheid in Indian cities (which reflects the continuing grip of caste) scroll.in/article/108494…

.yajnadevam Can you share the papers where the Markov process for Sanskrit vis a vis the IVC script is addressed?

Back in Venice with a gelato, and life is good.

Ok so an Indian student from Uttarakhand, studying in Korea, says people there ask him: “Which caste are you?” They can’t believe such things still exist in 2025. The good part ? The world is finally seeing India’s caste system for what it is dirty and outdated.

- Bro became a Executive Engineer - Owns multiple luxury cars - Owns multiple assets of 5 Crores - Caught with 10 Lakhs bribe All these assets with a salary of just ₹65,800 per month. India is insanely cooked by corruption 🤡

Having trouble choosing your next audiobook? For a limited time, you can download "Geek Sublime: The Beauty of Code, the Code of Beauty" for 50% off! Vikram Chandra, and Vikram Chandra audiobooks.com/promotions/pro…

A pilgrimage every time I come to Venice--coffee and breakfast at Caffè Florian on St. Mark's Square, where Hemingway drank coffee and wrote. Florian's shows up in Across the River and into the Trees. Someone's playing Tancredi's Isole outside. Quite appropriate.

Oh, yes, they did exist. And not just in bars. My family was in Kolkata for a couple of years in the sixties, and I remember adults talking about the cabaret show in the Lido Room at Firpo's. All those movies in which Ajit and Pran drank Vat 69 while Helen danced were based in

I can't find a good biography of James Prinsep. Can it really be the case that nobody has written one?

Also: in terms of aesthetics, Python is a crime against humanity. If there is an uglier coding language, I haven't seen it.

INDIAN INDEPENDENCE DAY All over India, Dalit Sanitation workers of medical colleges are forced by Upper Caste doctors to perform postmortem work without much safety and without any additional pay leaving Dalit sanitation workers exploited & traumatized. theprint.in/ground-reports…

The works of Shailaja Paik & Divya Kannan among others, show that a century ago, dominant-caste parents withdrew (or threatened to withdraw) kids from schools that even admitted a single Dalit student. Now their casteism uses vegetarianism as a weapon to wield oppression.

I've worked in a lot of places around the world, but I'm thankful I got to write next to the Grand Canal in Venice. Surreally beautiful.

More women read fiction--of any type, not just literary fiction--than men. "Roughly one in four men read a novel or short story in 2022, compared with fewer than half of all women." arts.gov/stories/blog/2…