A warm hello to all my new readers via . I do my best to bring you briefing of world events every Monday, through my lens, or anything else that caught my interest in the past week. Sometimes I do Read-and-Watch Roundups, if I get round to compiling my notes scattered on various platforms both offline and online.
“Sometimes even the Chinese themselves don’t understand their own people”
G20’s just about wrapped up with the African Union welcomed into its ranks. Xi decided to give it a miss, which many papers are heralding as a terrible snub that will bite him in the ass. India is (rightly) making bids to be the next factory of the world, all contingent on ensuring that developing economies increase their consumption. I disagree with all the breathless analyses about Le Snub, not because I have a crystal ball, but because, in the words of my sister, “Sometimes even the Chinese themselves don’t understand their own people”, which is the only thing I can say with any certainty right now. Perhaps, unlike the case my country’s PM put forth for multilateralism, Xi would like existing institutions not to be updated, but for new institutions to be created with China steering their creation, much like the US did post-WWII.
When an event is past its minority
Do you remember where you were 22 years ago? I sure do. I was completing homework, probably maths because I was bored enough that I was distracted by the radio in the background, which was in turn interrupted by an emergency news broadcast about a plane crashing into the World Trade Centre. The lights around the estate went dark, and to this day I swear it was because we live near the Paya Lebar Air Base. It might’ve been 2001 but we only still had dial-up, and TV was a big no-no, so I had to wait until the morning newspapers for a fuller update. I recall this event also because it signified a major rupture in the neoliberal, US-centric world order. Life couldn’t go back to “normal”, any more than it could post-GFC and post-Covid. I have no doubt I will witness many more such ruptures before I draw my final breath.
Watchlist
After last week’s Journey to the West, I thought we’d pause for a little time at the destination to share some gems I’ve discovered recently. Kohrra, set in Punjab, is a pretty riveting crime thriller with a twist I genuinely did not see coming until the series was nearly over. I asked a Bengali friend if the people in that region are so endemically violent, to which she responded that she thinks “That’s India. When the rule of law is so weak, people get away with murder, quite literally.” I couldn’t possibly agree or disagree, given that I’ve only visited one Indian city once, so I’d love to hear readers’ takes.
Another gem that caught my eye came by way of Yashica Dutt, whom I follow intermittently on social media. Made In Heaven has been on my watchlist for several years, but for some reason I never had the time to start watching it. The casteism episode 5 of season 2 that Yashica Dutt spoke out about piqued my interest, and I’ve been down a rabbit hole ever since. I get the feeling that the series portrays well enough the complex realities of living in one of the world’s largest metropolises. It has certainly opened my eyes to how South Asians are possibly more obsessed with class than the British are, if such a thing could be imagined. I thought the reality Seema Aunty was a caricature hyped for the screen, but I’m beginning to think that the business of shaadi is one that reflects the very core of the South Asian psyche, bringing all sorts of prejudices, biases, resentments and divides to the fore.
This is not to say that my own people, the Chinese, aren’t similarly concerned, but there’s been nothing quite like the Cultural Revolution that banned ostentatious weddings. We can journey back east to watch The Rational Life. If you can put up with the pacing over a few dozen episodes, you will find a layered story that touches on the lives and loves of Millennials and Gen-Zs in Shanghai, the struggles of those from third and second-tier cities who flock to first-tiers to seek their fortunes, and the age-old prejudices that seethe under the surface of supposed modernism and secularism.
Next on my watchlist? Probably Class and Bard of Blood. I’d love to hear what else you think I should watch. Anything with Sobhita Dhulipala in it, as with Dilraba Dilmurat, automatically heads to the top of my watchlist.