The Internet Personified: Ricochet, you take your aim

Welcome new subscribers! For a quick introduction to what I do here, here's a link to my very first newsletter explaining (sort of) what I wanted to do with this space. It's constantly evolving, of course, so I don't have a clear mission statement or what have you, but I generally add to the newsletter through the week, so it's a growing list of things I find interesting, basically. Anyway: HI! Please totally forward to your friends if you like it, thank you.

Just this second in apps: I now subscribe to every single streaming thing it is possible to subscribe to. Netflix, Hotstar, Amazon Prime, Apple Music and this morning, in adding some music to my phone, I found that Google Play music ALSO has a streaming service now. (Free trial for a month + Rs 83 per month after). Now I love Apple Music, I'm evangelical about it almost. Until Spotify comes to India, it's the best we can get. HOWEVER, it's not great on Android phones, so I already had Google Play hooked up there. Now I find you can get a desktop client for Google Play Music as well, and I'm going to be testing it this month. With playlists you can download offline, music you can sync between your phone and your laptop, it seems prett-ee cool. Time will tell, so watch this space for my considered review. Meanwhile, here's a link to the third party desktop client if you want to try it yourself. (PS: Apple Music is Rs 120 a month.)

This week in street shopping: Many years ago (two?) I was at a friend's friend's house, and she had over a foreign friend (which would make her my friend twice removed?) who was making decent money taking export surplus things from India and selling them abroad. So proud was she of this endeavour that getting her to say where she shopped was like pulling teeth. "OH MY GOD I AM TOTALLY NOT GOING TO STEAL YOUR BUSINESS" I thought in all caps, and then muttered something about yeah I've been going to Sarojini Nagar since I was a little girl so TAKE THAT. To which she was like, "Uh no, I go to Kalkaji and East Delhi's Wednesday market" and then sensing she said too much, refused to mention the subject again. Kalkaji is beyond my ken, but East Delhi? Yo, I spent my teen years there! My mother still lives there! I'm straight out of Patpargunj! (SUCH a great t-shirt idea.) So, Mum and I investigated, rather, she did, and when I went to visit after that visit, we checked it out, and Buddh Bazaar is not bad, guys, not bad at all. I went again for the first time in two years and found some very nice jewellery, a whole pile of organic cotton clothing obviously all from the same place, and elsewhere in Patpargunj a lovely white lace romper, and I kinda wish I had Mystery Shopper on my Facebook so I could tag her saying "Thanks for the recommendation!" because I'm not so nice sometimes. (I'm not sure of the address, but Wednesdays on the big Mother Dairy road, ask anyone to direct you to the Buddh Bazaar.)

This week in television: Switched At Birth, one of my very favourite teen dramas, had its series finale this week which was very sad. It's a very interesting show, beginning with two girls--one rich, one not--discovering they were switched at birth. Right? Right. BUT, plot twist, one of the girls is deaf thanks to childhood meningitis and then the whole show basically became a primer in deaf culture as the hearing girl started dating the deaf girl's best friend (also deaf), the whole family learns to sign, and they all learn to get along. Plus life lessons which I began to type out and then realised was a massive spoiler, so watch it. Also, you'll be surprised by how much sign language you pick up. (In honour of Switched At Birth, all the gifs in this newsletter are ASL words. Enable images to enjoy!)


This week in music: Aditi Dot, daughter of the late Amit Saigal, probably wasn't "accidentally" discovered as much as being a Music Person's Kid opened a few doors for her, but that aside, I enjoyed her music very much. Light and bright, even if it is a shitty video, so minimize the tab and just listen to the music. Here's Everybody Dances To Techno. You'll like it.

A few years ago in stuff I wrote: Organising a retro karaoke night next weekend and was reminded of this article I wrote for Open magazine ages ago about why Indians love retro music so much.


Sunday reading list: (You guys never said whether you liked the list format better than this one, so I'm going back to this.) ** In the Hindustan Times, a huge story on how some Indian call centres are scamming foreign customers. ** In Scroll, matrimonial ads for dogs are a thing now. ** Paromita Vohra in the Ladies Finger with a lovely long read on Chetan Bhagat's Half Girlfriend. (And a rare essay on the Bhagat which doesn't put him down for his writing skills, instead examines them in a thoughtful way.) ** In Open, how star ratings control our lives, lessons from an evening with a bunch of Zomato reviewers. ** Related: A Buzzfeed story on the harm of a star rating economy and what happens when you rate your Uber driver less than 5 stars. ** Lovely piece by Anushree in The Indian Express on what dating an African man in India taught her. ** I was following this Mowgli girl story with great interest, so was sad to see what's happening to her. ** Unrealistic NYC apartments in television shows. (LOOKING AT YOU, PHOEBE.)

Have a great week!
xx
m