Jalebi Uncoiled: December 2024

Friday, December 20, 2024

101. Last words yet to be written on a typewriter

A Vintage Smith-Corona
Typewriters are staging a comeback, and that is undoubtedly a breaking news. Everybody who has one and didn't know it had value now all of a sudden knows it has value. The humble typewriter, once a staple of offices, still holds a place of nostalgia and practical use in various cultures even today.

My proud possession - Smith Corona - is far from being merely a relic of the past. It embodies a rich tapestry of stories, innovations, and customs that vary from time to time, and country to country. There could not be any news better to hear that the typewriter of 80s still has demand.

The demand is strategic, and not nostalgic. German politicians are considering a return to using manual typewriters for producing sensitive documents in the wake of the US surveillance scandal. The Russian government too took similar measures after the spillover impact of espionage was partially revealed.

At an individual level, however, it is increasing incidents of cybercrime that is compelling people to live an analog life. It is forcing people to stay away from technology, enforcing them to talk less on the mobile. And for this reason, more people meet across the table with goodwill and coffee mutually exchanged.

The much talked about espionage case may have given the market a fillip, but typewriters had gained a comeback following Richard Polt's 2017 book 'The Typewriter Revolution'. Poets, writers, artists, and even students are putting words to paper and finding pleasure in generating the familiar acoustics.

There is more to it than that meet our eyes. Typewriters use our senses to focus on one thing at a time which demands our full attention, unlike a computer where tabs and screens distract attention. The feel of the keys and the sound of the return wheel produces a unique sensation that is unknowingly transferred onto the words.

If Global Typewriter Market Report 2024 is any indication, the typewriter market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 3% from 2023 to 2030. The tactile and mechanical feel of the typewriters will fuel its resurgence.

Typewriters never really went away, we only did.

The World of Jalebi

In 1870, Hobson-Jobson (a glossary of Anglo-Indian terms) specified that 'jelaubee' originates from the Arabic word zalabiya and the Persian word zalibiya and described it as 'a rich sweetmeat made of sugar and ghee, with a little flour, melted and trickled into a pan so as to form a kind of interlaced work, when baked.' Recipes for that original zalabiya have been found in West Asian cookbooks dating back to the 10th and 13th century, and ancient texts indicate that by the 15th century, the dish had made its journey from Persia to the tables of rich Indian merchants.

Meanwhile, this irresistible concoction seems to have travelled to other lands as well. In Lebanon, the sweetmeat is shaped like a finger rather than a swirl. In Afghanistan, it’s eaten alongside fish in the winter months. In Egypt, the Jewish community makes it to celebrate Hanukkah. It is a salutary reminder that food and language, arts and ideas, values and lifestyles are all products of give-and-take between the peoples of the world.

From The Golden Oldie by Shabnam Minwalla

Jalebi Management

Can the mouth-watering jalebi orchestrate global business? The uniform taste of the sweetmeat from its central form to its irregular extremities is worth imitating for any organisation's smooth functioning, says this book. "A jalebi connects at different fragile points to get bigger and bigger. The moral fibre in any country or any corporate culture can also grow when thought is not confined within the box,' writes Shombit Sengupta in Jalebi Management, a provocative out-of-the-box (sweet) management book based on critical social observation.