I love to read. Period. Here is a partial list of books that I have read over the past decade or so. I would highly recommend most of these.
Who can live without music! I have trained to sing (for more years than I want to recount) Rabindrasangeet (songs written and composed by Rabindranath Tagore) and Hindustani classical music. While this training has failed to enhance my singing prowess, it has succeeded in invoking in me a taste for certain kinds of music music.
I like to sketch, and I used to paint using watercolours and oils a long time back. Of all my hobbies, sketching has been the eaiest to pursue alongside my PhD work. I am not supertalented, but if I do want to sketch a tree, it does end up looking like one most of the time. I use MS Paint a lot these days, and pencils when I can find them. This is where you will find my artwork, when I manage to upload some stuff.
I love to play badminton and I used to be pretty good at it. I have also tried my hand at a number of other games that include table tennis and volleyball. I have played an occasional racquetball game as a graduate student, but I remember those more for the neck and ankle sprains than for anything else. I used to love to go on hikes, and still do. I just need to find myself some mountains to climb.
I do not like meaningless cinema. And I do not like pretentious cinema. Here is a list of movies that I have seen and loved - a list definitely more multi-lingual than my list of books. I also enjoy watching plays, sometimes more than movies. They seem more real.