“How many bottles did you bring back?”“Bottles?” I ask.“Booze Bob, booze! Didn’t you just return from Turkey? Do you know how much cheaper it is in Duty Free?”“No,” I tell them, “I didn’t
Sunday, 19th October, 2025
Support The Morung Express. Your Contributions Matter Click Here
Bob’s Banter
It was my late mother some years ago who sent me this meaningful piece, maybe remembering how I was so terrible at mathematics in school. A story about how just one word of praise helped a shy student break thr
How often we look at others and envy them their power and position, forgetting that most of us get equal chances of bettering ourselves, it’s only that we don’t grab opportunities that come our way:A young
The guide taking us on a tour of Istanbul was extremely articulate and expressive, suddenly he whispered, “There will be times,” he said, “when I will have to refer to our great leader, and I might not ta
A picture of a rocking chair in an advertisement of an old aged home, got me interested. ‘Relax!’ it said, “And let your life rock away!”I looked at it, and felt a sense of peace and calm. “Imagine!
As a teenager, a problem I quite often faced was pimples, and sometimes that single pimple sprouting out of my face on an important occasion could wreck my confidence and my evening! I remember an ad that
Have you seen somebody carrying a load of baggage, no not a passenger at a railway station or airport, but someone with a guilty past, failure, lack of confidence, someone who doesn’t know that all he’s got
Something I hear very often is the word, ‘stress’.According to a Greek legend, in ancient Athens a man noticed the great storyteller Aesop playing childish games with some little boys. He laughed and jeered
Very often I have people telling me of their problems. Most are genuine, some terrible and then I remember Tej. She was a dancer and one of the happiest people I’d ever met in my life. There was not a moment
He was the former president of a local rotary club, and I wondered at his sad face, “What happened?” I asked, concerned.“I got a call from the incoming president, he told me not to come for his installati
I remember once many years ago, catching a flight and standing in line for my security check; suddenly a family of eight walked down the line to the head of the queue and the father and another gentleman who I
How important it is for us to feel needed. As we get older we feel more and more that we are not needed anymore; not needed to make decisions, to shoulder burdens, that we are useless. Here’s a little inciden
I read that the PM was going to lead the Yoga Day celebrations at the UN!I’m glad yoga is being exported from India, and that slowly the whole world is realizing that attaining peace and joy are more importan
“I also wanted to be a writer!” is something I hear at practically every party or gathering I go to. “Oh!” I exclaim politely, “Then what happened?” “People dissuaded me from being one!
“Apply yourself..” Lee IacoccaAs fathers struggle to make ends meet and mothers struggle to bring up their families, you hear them longing for the day when they’ll have nothing to do.“Ah Bob!” they sa
“Come back!” I shouted at my dog a few years ago, when he was alive, but my huge German-Shepherd pretended he hadn’t heard my voice as he chased the poor, thin, undernourished, straggly bitch, who suddenl
From his hairstyle I knew he was a Boris Johnson fan, and watched as he, Boris like, swept his unkempt, unruly hair into a more unkempt, unruly Boris mess. “Looks like your former Prime Minister Boris Johnson
“How’s the heat in Bombay, Bob?” asks a friend. “Hot as hell!” I say, wiping the sweat flowing down my brow, then ask myself, “What do I know of hell, that I can compare the heat around me with
The other day someone told me his sister had bought a phone worth a huge amount. “But your sister’s just picked up a job!” I said.“With her job, she applied for a credit card!” I was told.And today, t
A few years ago, I'd gone to spend a month in Europe and when I boarded the Alitalia flight back home, there was an incredible childlike ecstasy like nothing I'd ever experienced before. I actually felt like da
