Nikhil Kamath's Blog

I wrote another Poem

Let’s continue this one from my post last month about writing poetry. So last year while I was still reeling from the awe-inspiring poetry from Gulzar sahab’s Green Poems, I attempted to write another one.

This I wrote in November 2024, sitting in a coffee shop in Khan Market, I looked out the window to see everything dull and grey. I was cold out that morning but by afternoon when I stepped out of the cafe to head back home, the weather was warm. Profusely sweating under my hoodie, which has jus...

Going to the Bookstore

Delhi has a thriving culture of bookstores, with each having its own set of regular customers. Just yesterday, I stopped by Khan Market’s Faqir Chand Bookstore for a book signing, and while I waited for the author to arrive, I struck up a conversation with Abhinav, who is the fourth generation running the iconic store and a good friend for the last five years or so. He pointed out how I am a regular at all bookstores and have a good friendship with the folks running these stores. He told me how ...

Collecting Pop Culture

Growing up, whenever we visited my aunt’s place in Mumbai, I would get to see my cousin Abhijeet Kini’s room full of posters of all kinds of rock bands from Korn to Def Leppard and Pearl Jam. And while that influenced my taste in music, another thing that influenced me was his collection of action figures, statues, and all sorts of collectibles. It was so cool to see all the cartoons I would see on TV, right there in front of me as figurines. As a kid, it was fascinating. Before I thought of wri...

Being a Tourist in my City

It is something I try to do every year. Pick a Sunday morning in late October or early November and go out for breakfast, walk around a market, and take in the calm and quiet surroundings. This morning, when I stepped out, I realised the last time I had done this was two years ago. That day, India was playing against South Africa in the 2023 Cricket World Cup. So, I decided to recreate that morning from 2023, and I took an autorickshaw to Khan Market.

The cool October morning air hit me in the fa...

I wrote a poem

Last year on a random October evening while sitting in a coffee shop, I was looking out the window. At this point, I had already read ‘Green Poems’ by Gulzar sahab and was very much inspired to write about nature and things that surrounded me.

I took my writing journal out and started toying with this idea of poem dedicated to the month of October in Delhi. There will definitely be plenty of poems going by that title so I decided to call this one ‘Autumn’, which I know again will be a very common...

Barbershop Conversations

Last Sunday, I had my monthly visit to the barber's. It's a once-a-month Sunday morning routine that my dad and I try to stick to, because Sunday mornings are slower than usual. Verma's Saloon is the place where we've been going for a haircut for over 2 decades. (I have been going there since I was four years old, so go figure.)

This small three-chair shop was started by Verma ji, who was assisted by his apprentices, Deep and Master, at that time. Now that Verma ji has retired, Deep and Master ru...

That One Morning When It Rained Too Much

Those who know me know that I don't like going out when it rains. On most days, I don't mind puddles or traffic. But there’s something about heavy rain that brings back one morning I’d rather forget.

Every time it rains, social media is flooded with people romanticising rain and the weather, accompanied by cheesy Bollywood songs in the background. That is something I can't relate to anymore because my relationship with rainy days has been more tumultuous than romantic. I still vividly remember t...

Love stories and heartbreaks

When I tell people that I am a published author, the first question they ask is, “Is it your story?”

And when they learn I have written a love story, they ask, “So did it not end well?”

It’s so preposterous of them to think that for someone to write romance or a love story, they have to go through a heartbreak. It’s like what Jordan in Rockstar was told: that to make a hit song, you have to get your heart broken. That is not the case at all.

All this is just some myth that some big-shot writer has ...

I started off with writing fan-fiction...

The first story I ever wrote was fan-fiction. I was ten and a big fan of Power Rangers. I didn't even know what I was writing was fan fiction.

My fascination for the characters from Dino Thunder, SPD and Mystic Force inspired me to write the sort of Power Rangers story I wanted to watch on TV.

It was much later that I realised what I wrote was called fan fiction, which was popular with people writing online. This taught me that you should write the kind of stories you want to read. It was an impor...

When the old guard says goodbye

It was a bright sunny day in Mumbai during the June of 2015. I was visiting my sister and brother-in-law who had moved to Mumbai a a month back and being a weekend, we decided to go to South Bombay for lunch and sightseeing.

The taxi ride from Andheri to Fort took about an hour or so, it was hot and humid outside as usual. We reached this little Parsi eatery, Jimmy Boy, which had an old world charm like most Parsi eateries in the city. It was a busy day, so we waited for some time before getting ...