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About Venky
If you are a relative or friend of mine, you already know everything and can proceed to the goodies!
Just type in www.geocities.com\********** (type the first three letters of the little one's name followed by the seven letter name I am known by at home, all smalls), and you can enter my photo page.
If you are a family member, why not join our family club? Just email me at webmaster@venkytalks.freeservers.com and I'll give the details.
If you want to go back to Venkytalks.com, click here.
In the unlikely event that you are a total stranger, Hi. Thanks for visiting my site. The best way to know me is through my writings. But if you want more personal details:
ME
I am 31, and you know what I looked like many years ago from the photograph on my home page. As soon as I scan a more recent (and decent!) photo from my photo albums (currently in another city), I'll update it. I am a consultant pathologist, a teacher of undergraduate and postgraduate medical students and a tumour biology researcher by profession. I write papers, monographs and text books in my own field.
My hobbies
Include birdwatching (the feathered and not the legged variety); travel especially to national parks; astronomy; photography especially birds, monuments, insects and related to my profession; history including world, Indian, war and political; philosophy especially modern and ancient Indian, music especially rock and 80s pop, writing on all of the above interests as well as some fiction writing, and finally reading. I read anything of interest, usually related to one of my above interests and most of all English fiction. I like science fiction, fantasy, humour, horror, classics, children's stories and my favourite is detective fiction. Of the latter, I like the early 20th century stories, in the early days of detective fiction writing. (Recent addition: web publishing!)
Music
Favourite groups: Alan Parsons Project, Mister Mister, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Santana, Fleetwood Mac etc.
Favourite classical: Mozzart (most), Strauss (waltzes), Tchaikovsky (light classical ballet), not much else.
Indian classical: only MS Subhalakshmi's and MK Thyagaraja Bhagavathars light classical. Hate most of the rest. Violin is OK. Hate nadaswaram.
Indian Pop: Only 50s and 60s Hindi film songs, some 70s. Hate 80s and 90s film and pop
Others: Love early days of rock and roll (Elvis, Little Richards, Bill Haley and the rest). Sometimes listen to and sing 40s and 50s crooners (Nat King Cole and Co), mainly because it is possible to sing without accompaniment (and its about love!) Listen to a little big band jazz and 40s tap dance and broadway musicals (i.e. Singing in the rain, Fred Astaire & Co). Like but havent followed alternative and grunge of the 90s. Listen to some of the 70s disco for nostalgia. Like good dance (disco & Pop) but hate bad ones (that is most. eg: I like Aqua's Barbie Girl, but hate everything else by that group)
Reading
Favourite detective, early: Christie, R Austin Freeman, Freeman Wills Croft, John Dickson Carr etc.
Favourite detective, modern: Ruth Rendell. Havent read new authors
Favourite American PI: Hammet, Chandler, Spillane, John D MacDonald, Sue Grafton.
Favourite Spy: Deighton (love it), leCarre (only when in the mood), Flemming, Maclean (not recently). Hate Nick Carter. Havent read new stuff, don't particularly like 500 page best seller types like Tom Clancy, but OK.
Favourite Classics: Poe! (But that is detective and horror, and modern!). Vanity Fair, Pickwick papers, Hemmingway, Moby Dick, Jerome K Jerome (a sense of humour is a must in other words) . Hate Jane Austen, Tolstoy, Nicholas Nickleby like stuff. Dislike sad stories like Tess, Jude, Adam Bede, Great Expectations (probably because they are so good at it!)
Modern Classics: Saul Bellow, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Salman Rushdie.
Children's Classics: George Macdonald, E Nesbit, The never ending story, Lord of the rings.
Children's Nostalgia: Blyton, Three Investigators, William, Tintin, Asterix etc
Humour: PGW. Saki. Havent read much else that I really like, except classics. Durrel is more like nature, as is Herriot.
Indian: Only in English! Havent read anything decent in Hindi or Tamil (Havent read anything in Hindi or Tamil at all!) except the odd children's story which was awful. Vocabulary abysmal.
Philosophy: Agree almost completely with AJ Ayer and Kant by Durant (couldn't read the original more than a few pages). Disagree violently with Aldous Huxley, Hesse etc, Freud, Hegel, Schopenheur. Havent read anyone modern. Disagree violently with almost all the systems of Indian philosophy, except with portions of the Gita (only if interpreted in my own way).