Monday, August 26, 2013

The DECCAN YEMATSO - Deccan Pens’ tribute to the legendary Pelikan M800 ...

This is about the pen that I bought recently (on 21 August 2013) from Deccan Pen Stores, Hyderabad.  When Umair showed me this pen I thought I’d seen this pen before and probably hadn’t bought it then, and told so to Umair.  He said this was a recent model and I couldn’t have seen it before.  I wondered for a while and then it struck...

FLASHBACK ALERT!!!

I was in some way part of Hari’s novel project where he had wanted Deccan to make him an ebonite pen modelled on the Pelikan M800 that could hold a Pelikan screw-in nib unit.  It was codenamed the Yematso Project.  By virtue of living in Hyderabad, I became the messenger, informer, reminder-er (?), and finally, courier...was generally liaising between Hari and Deccan.  In fact, I got to see this Pelikanised Deccan FP and hold it, before Hari could see it, who had actually thought of it in the first place.  So, that was a rare privilege.  That pen can be seen here...
 FLASHBACK OVER..

All this came back to me in a while, but when Umair showed it to me, I thought, “Great...another Pelikan inspired pen from Deccan...this time the M800...”  The last time they did one, it was modelled on the Pelikan 120 and Hari had reviewed it here...they called it the Pelkan...


That day, coincidentally, I had my blue striated M800 in my pocket and Umair showed some interest and wanted to see it...he appeared to be delighted... I now feel, my M800 must have reminded him of their new model and it was then that he fetched this pen and showed it to me...

My guess is that Deccan had prepared the moulds/dies to make the pen for Hari and then later decided to use that to come out with a new model...

The pen under review is good where looks are concerned and Deccan has done a fairly decent job in emulating the design, shape, and size of the original... I would say that it is a ‘tribute’ by Deccan...

The cap jewel is rather well done...what is part of the clip itself in M800 is made as the full cap jewel...attention is given to detail as you can see in the picture, except for the logo on the top... I felt, briefly, perhaps the calligraphic D might have looked good on the top...not enough space...there is a cap band too and there is a hole in it and I don’t know why or for what reason...the barrel end is also decently done, though it is a mock-piston, so can’t unscrew... just a design feature...and BTW, this is an ED filler pen...no trims in the mock-piston...

The clip is their now regular Advocate ball clip...I would have liked a ‘beaky’ clip...and they have the ‘beaky’ clip on some of their other models, and they could have fixed one for this model too...I am slightly disappointed here...the ‘beaky’ clip could have given a sense of completion to the pen... I told this to Umair, and he had also brought out their earlier Pelkan model (recent version), which had the ‘beaky’ clip... I asked him if he could swap the clips, he gave both pens to the service section to see if they could do it, but they returned both pens intact saying that the diameter (on top) of the ‘beaky’ clip was small for this pen...the calligraphic D, the Deccan logo, is also seen on the cap, but on both pens I bought, this D doesn’t seem to be ‘imprinted’ properly...the forelock and the back curve look incomplete... I asked about this to Zubair, and he noticed this for the first time when I showed it to him!  He said there must be something wrong with the needle that inscribes this on the cap and it doesn’t seem to press evenly on the surface...anyway, hope they rectify it soon...

Once the cap is unscrewed, it is a straightforward Deccan pen...all nicely done...nib, feeder fixed properly in the section...the nib says OLYMPIC IST QUALITY U.S.A.  The flow is very good and the nib is not scratchy, but not very smooth, either...but no tripping, skipping, etc. ... easy flow...

I inked it the next day evening and I wrote this post in longhand first with this pen yesterday...nice fine line, I would have liked it to be a slightly more thicker... I normally don’t meddle with the original fittings and let them be, but I might go back and ask Deccan to fit this pen with a Deccan medium and also the ‘beaky’ clip...

I bought swirly green and swirly brown, but seem to like the green one better, and that is what I inked first...


I want to call it the DECCAN YEMATSO...

The Deccan Yematso

Section and clip

The Deccan logo

Yematso and M800

Both cap jewels

Yematso's cap jewel - close-up

Yematso's cap jewel - close-up

M800's piston and Yematso's mock piston

Writing Sample

Two Deccan pens with the 'beaky clip'

Friday, August 23, 2013

First time - twin posts – 2 – Elmore Leonard passes away ...

On Wednesday (21 August 2013) I read in The Hindu that Elmore Leonard, one of the finest crime fiction writers, passed away the previous day (20 August 2013) ... he was one of my favourite writers ... fellow blogger Vinod introduced me to Elmore Leonard and since then, I have been buying and reading his books ... I read his novels The Big Bounce,  Killshot,  Rum PunchMaximum BobCity PrimevalPronto, and others ... the most recent Leonard book that I bought was his collection of short stories, When the Women came out to Dance, which I enjoyed thoroughly... I sent a text message to Vinod to share my sorrow at Elmore Leonard’s passing away ... he replied saying that he too was sad and regretted not buying Elmore Leonard’s Djibouti at Dehradun recently ... well, you might find it in Abids one of these days, Vinod... 

A number of Elmore Leonard’s novels were adapted into movies, but Leonard was happy with only one ... Rum Punch was made into a movie called Jackie Brown (written and directed by Quentin Tarantino) ... (the Wikipedia entry on Jackie Brown says this ... “Leonard loved the screenplay, considering it not only the best of the twenty-six screen adaptations of his novels and short stories, but also stating that it was possibly the best screenplay he had ever read.”)... as a small tribute to Elmore Leonard, I am going to read Rum Punch again and watch this movie ...

Elmore Leonard R. I. P.

First time - twin posts – 1 – post about a post that should have actually been this post ... what?

This post should have been about the two Indian crime thrillers that I read recently...I had bought quite a few books online and wanted to write about these two...Mumbaistan and Compass Box Killer, both by Piyush Jha ... I read them and liked them quite a lot ... I started writing in longhand with (one of) my fountain pen(s) yesterday, and covered Mumbaistan substantially, and thought I’d complete it at home in the evening ... 

Though I had taken the half-written manuscript out of my backpack and kept it on my table, I couldn’t  get back to it, and then thought thought I’d continue, write it out, then type it, and post it during the day today ... (classes haven’t yet started for us and I am comparatively free during the day in college...)

But in today morning’s unusual hurry (it is called hurry-burry here), I forgot to put the manuscript back in my backpack ... actually I was quite excited about writing on these two Indian crime thrillers and was looking forward to completing and posting it today ... and remembered at my bus stop that I had forgotten to put back the manuscript in my bag ... I was pissed with myself ... so, that post will have to wait ... for a couple of days at least ... 

Thursday, August 8, 2013

Only two visits and this is what Abids’ second-hand book market has done to me...

Yesterday late afternoon I was in Secunderabad...had some work in the general post office and the bus dropped me right in front of Best Books permanent outlet at YMCA...neki and ask ask... I went in...

I had visited the shop a month and a half ago after my “first” visit to Abids ... I found many books that I wanted to read, especially crime fiction... they had a lot of Harlan Coben and John Lescroart novels... they had 1 to 5 of Harlan Coben’s Myron Bolitar series...  I hadn’t read a single Coben novel and I picked up these five novels ... I had seen some Harlan Coben novels at Abids, but didn’t buy them...so I thought why not now...each book was priced Rs.95, except one, which for some strange reason despite being part of the same series by the same publisher was priced Rs.125... at Abids I had bought five books for only Rs.110 ...  I asked the chap to reduce the price...and said I was willing to pay Rs.75 per book... he refused... at earlier times at Best Books, I would have asked him to reconsider and then he’d reduce the price a little and I’d buy a couple of books, if not everything I had selected... but very refreshingly, I just said fine and walked out without buying a single book...

I would have bought all five books if he had accepted my price, (me) not minding the fact that the prices would be much much lower in Abids ... but it is also a fact that luck plays a big role in Abids...I just didn’t feel like paying his price...

Yesterday once again...I searched for books and all the five Harlan Coben books that I had selected during my previous visit were still there on the shelf...but a different chap was minding the store...after some shelf gazing, I picked up these five books once again and went to the counter... he said Rs.505 for five books...this time I was somehow willing to pay Rs.80 for each book and told him so... I said Rs.400...he said no...Rs.450 for five books...I stuck to Rs.400...he said no...I said fine and walked out without buying a single book...

Abids ... sigh ... hope I go this Sunday...