Growing up as the youngest of seven siblings, Khyrunnisa A says she had to turn to humor to hold herself together in her family and, at times, get the better of them. Perhaps it was this “hands-on experience” that helped her stand out as a humor writer with her bestselling book. tongue in cheek, going into seven reprints. “You should have a funny bone to appreciate humor,” she says.
Like his new book laugh merry spin Hits bookstores, the award-winning writer sits in his cozy book-lined office in Thiruvananthapuram to talk about his work, a downright funny account of his first trip to the United States in 2018. Khyrunnisa and her husband, P Vijaya Kumar, traveled to the United States to spend time with their son, Amar, and his wife, Arpitha, and to attend Arpitha’s convocation.
The interesting part of the book is her charming depiction of the people she meets – taxi drivers, bus drivers, museum guides, passers-by, waiters and the like, and the eye for detail she has while capturing in words his experiences in the United States. .
She had no intention of writing a book while on vacation. On their journey, the duo, both retired English teachers and quiz masters, traveled from the East Coast to the West of the United States, meeting friends, relatives and their wide circle of friends. students. They visited six states: Illinois, Wisconsin, New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts and California. “I usually jot down mundane things in a diary like where we went, when to reserve a bottle of gas, etc. I certainly don’t bare my soul in my diary. But it’s a record of what happened one day,” she said.
Khyrunnisa A and P Vijaya Kumar | Photo credit: Christophe Francis
In the United States, she continued to write down the names of places she visited and what they did one day. In California, Abdul Nizar, a friend, asked her if she was planning a book when he saw her writing in the notebook. “It was then that I thought of a book about our misadventures and memorable experiences in the United States. The more I thought about it, the more I felt it would be interesting to capture the thoughts of a first-time visitor to the United States. ‘stranger’,” the author explains. Then she noticed that the notes were getting longer and longer and more descriptive as well.
When she pitched the idea to her editors, they were enthusiastic about the idea of a travelogue that would take readers to tourist spots in the United States and museums – famous and little-known, etc. She talks about places and facilities that you wouldn’t find in travel brochures.
As she gushes about blue skies, clean streets and disciplined queues, she also talks about restrooms or rather their scarcity, including the not-so-spic-and-span toilet blocks, the unheated motel, and more. . But, throughout the book, she retained the light-hearted tone of the narrative and is a big laugh as we read about the food, people, and places.
With cover illustration by Priya Kuriyan, the book was published by Pratilipi.
