<h2>I believe i can fly</h2>
Malaika Arora contemplates her options in a fairytale white gown at a promo shoot in Goregon on Friday. Pic/Satej Shinde
<h2>Catching up on the JLF</h2>
The country's annual literary rendezvous, the Jaipur Literature Festival 2020 is all guns blazing in its third day and Diggi Palace is as overrun with writers and readers as expected. In its third day, a lot went down at the famed venue and here are some highlights for lit-hungry Mumbaikars.
<img title="Meru Gokhale and Sonali Bendre at the session" src="https://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2020/jan/Meru-Gokhale-photo.jpg" alt="Meru Gokhale and Sonali Bendre at the session" /> Meru Gokhale and Sonali Bendre at the session
The who's who of Mumbai was making its presence felt there. Musician Shubha Mudgal was in conversation with Sudha Sadanand for a session where she read out excerpts from her first book, Looking for Miss Sargam, a collection of short stories. Sonali Bendre Behl on the other hand spoke of being reintroduced to books thanks to like-minded readers in a heart-warming session.
<img title="Shubha Mudgal" src="https://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2020/jan/Shubha-Mudgal.jpg" alt="Shubha Mudgal" />
Ranjit Hoskote spoke on the subject, "Why publishing poetry is important", discussing the economics of the published verse and its distribution with Ashok Vajpeyi, Chris Agee, Madhav Kaushik and Mindy Gill. In other updates, politician Shashi Tharoor spoke eloquently of public and literary life.
<h2>Taking on litfests, podcast style</h2>
It's officially lit-fest season and this time, listening as much as watching is all the rage, with podcasts taking a share of the pie. There's one that just dropped from Maed in India, a podcast, called The Lit Pickers. The show, hosted by journalists Deepanjana Pal and Supriya Nair, is all about books, brunches and banter. Predictably, the first episode takes on, you guessed it, lit fests.
Here, the two, in a fresh new style, speak about what they like, what they don't and the many quirks that you only get to see at the country's burgeoning list of such events. A quick listen-in gave this diarist an insight into the workings of such a festival, an update on new titles and bold opinions. We can't wait for the next episode.
<h2>An achievement in translation</h2>
The Romain Rolland Book Prize recognises translation of French titles in Indian languages, including English. This year, Dipa Chaudhari and Puneet Gupta took away the award for translating the first three albums of the Asterix series into Hindi, in Jaipur.
<img title="An achievement in translation " src="https://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2020/jan/An-achievement-in-translati.jpg" alt="An achievement in translation " />
Commenting on the title, Emmanuel Lenain, the ambassador of France to India said, "I understand that the translation of Asterix was not easy, the names of the characters being products of word play with references to French terms. The translators have indeed done an exceptional work of contextualising some of these names while staying true to their original meaning."
<h2>Show up and hug it out</h2>
The country's queer community might have had cause for cheer when Section 377 of the IPC, which banned sexual activities "against the order of nature", was abolished. But it's not that people in this country have lost all prejudice against homosexual people.
<img title="Show up and hug it out" src="https://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2020/jan/Sumit-Pawar.jpg" alt="Show up and hug it out" />
That is why the onus is on us to ensure that queer folk don't feel ostracised. And one way of doing that is taking part in an event called Queer Hugs, part of Queer Azaadi Mumbai Pride 2020, this evening. As the name suggests, it involves giving and getting a hug from a member of the community, exchanging warmth and understanding, in the process.
<h2>Much ado about poha</h2>
Love it or hate, you can't ignore poha if you live in Mumbai, the breakfast staple served with chopped onion and a dash of lime. But BJP leader Kailash Vijayvargiya seems to think that it is a delicacy that's typical to Bangladesh. He accused labourers working in his house of being possible Bangladeshis based only on the fact that they were having the beaten rice dish. This predictably sent social media into splits.
<img title="Much ado about poha" src="https://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2020/jan/poha.jpg" alt="Much ado about poha" />
One user commented, "My dhobi showed up eating a burger. I think he's American." Another posted a photo of the dish and wrote, "Hum poha bhi khayenge, aur kaagaz nahin dikhayenge." Seems like the labourers might have been eating the much-loved dish, but Vijayvargiya will have to eat his own words.
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