Surely you’re joking Mr Feynman!

Amazing read! Concise, witty, random memoirs of Nobel laureate Richard Feynman told in a very engaging manner.

I am so impressed by Mr. Feynman, who seems to have such a wonderful approach to life! Mundane stuff which might not even provoke any interest in most of the humans, are actually source of fun to his persona. Ever willing to learn and try out new things, enjoying whatever venture he takes up.

He seemed to have picked up so many things not to ace in them, but just to have fun learning them. Like when he had to visit Brazil or Japan for some work, he took up learning Portuguese and Japanese respectively, just because he was going there and wanted to mix up with the local people. Then when he was in Brazil since he was interested in Samba music, he picked up an instrument called frigideira and became a part of some local carnival band. He also played drums and kept experimenting with various rhythms. Not that he could read music or anything, just that he enjoyed playing drums, could make out different rhythms, and was decent enough to give music to some ballet performances.

Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie

This book by Salman Rushdie is my first book by this author. Obviously having heard so much about the author n the book, I had to give it a try out of curiosity. However a bestseller need not be the “best read” for everybody. This one wasn’t for me.

The book is told in first person by the protagonist Saleem Sinai who happens to have born at the stroke of midnight the moment India got its independence. So the moment India and Pakistan were born, Saleem was also born. And his growth & destiny is entangled with that of the newly born nations.

Now having born at such a momentous moment, he was empowered with special powers, and so were all those kids who were born during the first hour after midnight. Hence forming the Midnight’s children group. Saleem possessed the power to read people’s mind, to talk to them through their minds. Later on in the story he lost that power, and instead gained the power of immensely sensitive olfactory sense. So he could smell not only the regular smells or fruits and flowers, but also the smell of human nature, the deceit, truth, hatred etc.