"Roman and Julian" is a story about two young men whose loving relationship is compared to Romeo's and Juliet's. Just like the famed lovers from Verona, the men are aware of songs of the nightingales and the larks, and exchange secret vows of love. Whether they manage to escape the sad fate of their predecessors, you can find out when you read the book. 
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The sun is shining brilliantly as I walk home. I share the street with gorgeous, leafy trees and passers-by. They seem to come from all walks of life: students, employees, parents, grand-parents, and the homeless. That last group is the most outspoken. Only yesterday I heard a speech about President Nixon--somebody was reliving their past. Maybe it was better than the present for them? Just maybe. About other groups I know nothing about, except from my impressions of them, which may be totally misleading. "Who are they?" I often wonder. "Are they as happy as I am?Read more

As we sit in the airplane, I look at the clock that’s moving painfully slowly. If schedule does not change because of delays, we’ll reach home in about 15 hours. I feel like time has been playing jokes with us, showing its power. “You see,” it seems to whisper, “You said I was passing too fast during your stay in Kerala, so I slowed down, specially for you.”Read more

The course that focused on socio-cultural taboos passed way too quickly. We discussed a variety of fields plagued by taboos--education, people with disabilities, female genital mutilation (FGM), and taboos expressed in arts. I loved the discussions that emerged after the students had been introduced to the topics, either by listening to a story or an NPR interview. I think it helped that the students were all outside their home environment.Read more

Where do I begin to tell the stories of so many people whose lives were marked by war, disease, and prejudice? How does one prioritize the stories if they all break your heart under their weight? I kept asking myself these questions for the past week. I haven't come up with any answers yet. I simply immersed myself in the stories. Here is a short one: A young man had a Liberian father and a mother from Sierra Leone. Because of the long wars woven into the history of the two countries, he traveled back and forth with his family.Read more

We set the alarm clock to wake us up every two hours, so I could check email from my professors. The deadline to send the dissertation to the grad office was fast approaching, and I was hoping to get it out of the way before traveling to Trivandrum on Saturday. One professor said she was entirely happy with what I had written,but another one said she'd be entirely happy if  I connected my findings to Carl Roger's (1963, 1995)  theory of motivation.Read more

You know how when you learn a new word, you suddenly hear it used everywhere? The same seems to be true when it comes to reading. Just before coming to India, I immersed myself in Barack Obama’s autobiography, Dreams from my father. Barack described how shocked he was when he found out (by chance, in a library in Indonesia) that there were “treatments” offered to Black people to lighten their skin color. I was shocked, too, and ashamed. Above all, however, I was surprised.Read more