A couplet a day
Having grown up in south India, I am always hesitant to read Hindi or Urdu poetry—English translations rarely seem to do it justice and trudging through the originals is pure pain. Thinking With Ghalib: Poetry For A New Generation by Anjum Altaf and Amit Basole (Roli Books, 2021) seems written for someone like me—conversant enough to know when a translation seems “off” yet not comfortable enough to seek out the original. Basole and Altaf pick 30 Ghalib couplets, one for each chapter, and ask you to read (and think about) just one a day. The Urdu and the Hindi are followed by the Roman transliteration of the couplet, allowing one to read and hear, in one’s own voice, what the original sounds like, so that you can start contemplating its many meanings even before you get into the authors’ explanation.—Shalini Umachandran
Spot the space station
The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest man-made structure ever put into orbit. While we might never be able to see it up close, there is a smartphone app that lets you spot it in the night sky as it passes your area. The ISS Detector is an easy-to-use app which tells you about forthcoming sightings of the ISS. When you receive an app notification, all you have to do is step outside and watch the space station, using the radar in the app. I have used it to spot the ISS multiple times—and it can be a surreal experience. If you want to go beyond the ISS, the app allows you to see comets, planets and objects like the Hubble Space Telescope and the Tiangong, the Chinese space station. The ISS Detector is available on both Android and iOS. —Nitin Sreedhar
Hopping to travel
A good beer can often instil the desire to travel. My latest wanderlust-stirring find is a Czech Pilsner from Mumbai’s Drifters Brewery. It’s a clean, crisp, straw-coloured brew with pronounced hoppy notes, just perfect for summer. The best way to relish it is slowly and with full attention. Chugging it would be a sin. Inevitably, the next step after discovering and enjoying a beer is geeking out on Google. The birthplace of this lovely beer is the historic town of Plzeň (or Pilsen). Unsurprisingly, the biggest draw is the Pilsner Urquell Brewery that has made the town world-famous. Between sips of this refreshing brew, I dreamt of visiting it. One day, perhaps, I will.—Jahnabee Borah
Keep your coffee hot
If you, like me, like to linger over your morning cup of coffee or tea while scrolling through Instagram reels, you know there’s nothing that kills that buzz like your drink getting cold while you watch Pedro Pascal being cute for the 50th time. I discovered the perfect solution for this and regret the fact that, like Pascal, it came into my life quite late—double-walled borosilicate coffee mugs that keep your drink hot (or cold) for a much longer time than your regular ceramic or bone china cup. It’s something to do with the double-layered insulation, which is standard across several sizes and shapes of the mugs that come with or without handles. I do not have a specific brand to recommend—there are plenty of options on online shopping sites and as far as I can tell they all do the job quite well—but this has been an absolute game changer.—Shrabonti Bagchi
