Intellectual Voyeurism over Notun Gurer Payesh

Had the "Videshis" over for what I call - a "hair down and feet-up" dinner at home.There were :Helen & Andrew, Collin with his wife Lisa and Mom, who is visiting, Brigid and Rosemary. Sameer, Buddha & Geeta and us provided the asian counter-point. Rosemary's husband, Daniel, had been pulled away to Bhuj for reporting alongwith the over 20 strong BBC crew gathered from all over the world. He was supposed to go to B'lore to do research for his book but was called off for this assignment. Cudn't agree more with her that, there is a lot of 'over-reporting' happening out there - journalistic "voyeurism" as she called it. I think it's particularly true of some of the Indian channels like Zee and even to some extent Star. But, what Andrew said was frightening. Apparently - Kathmandu comes on the same seismic fault line as Gujrat - both part of that pre-historic coast line , along which the continental plates had collided. So, if it wasn't Gujrat this time it could well have been Kathmandu. It seems that, before the last major quake in Nepal ( in 1934 ? ) there was a similar quake in Gujrat just 2 months before that. An earthquake is a great "leveller" literally - must circulate the stuff I received over e-mail tomorrow. otherwise, it was a nice quiet evening - totally realxed and informal, as it was meant to be. Nina had turned out a home-cooked traditional Bengali meal - Karai-shootir Kachuri, Alur Dam, Cholar Daal and Shorshe Maach, which everybody seemed to enjoy. Rounded it off with a double-barrel dessert - combination of Channar Payesh from Trishna and Notun Gurer Payesh. There can never be too much of a "sweet thing" in a Bong party.